Sacked MODEC workers demand reinstatement or…

The Deputy General Secretary of the Ghana Transport, Petroleum and Chemical Workers Union (GTPCWU) of the Trades Union Congress, Francis Salla has demanded the immediate recall of 29 dismissed staff of MODEC, managers of the production platform FPSO Kwame Nkrumah.

The dismissal of the workers, who are part of 71 Ghanaian technical workers on the platform, followed a sit-down strike by the workers on the offshore installation on October 29, 2014 to demand improved conditions.
 
Mr Salla said should MODEC fail to reinstate the workers, GTPCWU would team up with other sister unions to seek justice and that the action of the company was against the agreement reached at their last meeting.
 
“We will not issue any ultimatum, but we want our members to be reinstated immediately without delay as we have received a call for a meeting with Petroleum Commission and we are waiting for the outcome,” he said.
 
Illegal strike
The affected staff were yesterday handed their dismissal letters with the explanation that they had embarked on an illegal strike aboard the FPSO, which placed the facility at a major risk resulting in the loss of millions of dollars to the company.
 
The dismissed workers were also given medical forms to go to the hospital for a routine check-up within 10 working days or the company says it would not be liable for any health condition thereafter.
 
The letter to the workers signed by the In-Country Manager of MODEC indicated that it had considered all factors and was no longer able to engage the services of the 29 workers.
 
The letter said “You are therefore, dismissed without notice in line with Section 30(3) of Act 651 from your employment effective Monday November 10, 2014.”
 
However according to the workers, the dismissal was contrary to a signed agreement between all parties which also promised the affected workers job security.
 
“Therefore, we expect that our employers will respect the agreement reached and wait for the outcome of the deliberation before sacking everybody,” some of the sacked workers said.
 
The workers said after several hours of deliberations at the end of last month with their employers MODEC Ghana, Ghana Transport, Petroleum and Chemical Workers Union (GTPCWU) of Trades Union Congress and Petroleum Commission (PC) it was agreed that the striking workers would still remain employees of their current employer.