Maritime workers picket shipping firm over unpaid salaries

Abiodun oba |

Murphy Shipping and Commercial Services, a firm located in Trans-Amadi Industrial Estate, has been picketed by angry maritime workers for alleged unpaid salaries and other benefits.

Some of the workers, who claimed to have put in between 10 to 20 years of service in the company, displayed placards with various inscriptions, depicting their frustrations.

The workers explained that they had been blocking the only entrance to the company for about two months due to the unpaid salaries and their 2017 leave allowances.

The workers, who spoke under the auspices of Maritime Workers Union of Nigerian and the Senior Staff Association of Shipping, Freight and Forwarding Agency, pointed out that they had held series of meetings with their employers on how to resolve the problem to no avail.

The unit Chairman of MWUN, Murphy Shipping Branch, Morgan Reward, stated that blocking the main entrance to the company became the last resort after the aggrieved workers had sought the intervention of the Federal Ministry of Labour to intervene in the matter without success.

Reward also claimed that the shipping firm refused to remit pension funds deducted from salaries paid them in the past to their pension administrator.

He vowed that the angry workers would go to court if nothing was done to urgently address the matter.

“We have served here for a long time, an average of 15 years. They owe us six months’ salaries. Apart from that, they have been deducting our pension funds, but have failed to remit the funds for over 32 months.

“We have written to government agencies, the Ministry of Labour and Productivity, the Rivers State House of Assembly Committee on Labour, to no avail. We have exhausted all means of addressing the issue.

“That is why we decided to picket the company. We want the management of Murphy Shipping Services to come and sit down with us for a dialogue to address the issues,” Reward added.

Also, the Secretary General of the Senior Staff Association of Shipping, Freight and Forwarding Agency (Murphy Shipping Branch), Chijioke Avuru, recalled that the unionists began picketing the company since July 16, adding that they would not leave until the management met with them.

Avuru also called on the Rivers State Government to intervene in the matter, saying, “We have been suffering for over six months now. Six months salaries are being owed.

“No reason has been given by the management. Since we have been here, they (management) have never come to address us. Legal action is our last resort now.

“Before we embarked on this action, we have written to the management, but to no avail. We have held meetings to no avail,” Avuru stated.

However, several calls to the mobile phone of the Head, Corporate Affairs of the firm, Taiwo Durojaiye, were not answered.