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Monday, 08 September, 2008, 17:50 GMT | more prices >>

Nigeria withdraws strike threat



By Upstream staff 

Nigeria's senior oil workers' union has withdrawn its industry-wide strike threat after a deal with the local unit of ExxonMobil over a labour dispute.

The union had accused the US energy giant on Friday of reneging on a series of agreements in the dispute over the sacking of about 100 Nigerian workers. Oil union Pengassan had planned to meet tomorrow to decide whether or not to launch a crippling strike.

"We have postponed the meeting indefinitely because we have received a positive response from Mobil which has agreed to recall the sacked workers," Pengassan deputy secretary general Lumumba Okugbawa said.

The union, which had also accused the company of frustrating negotiations to resolve the dispute, said ExxonMobil agreed at talks with high-level government officials to withdraw legal processes pending at an industrial court.

Reuters reported that the union had deferred the strike on at least two previous occasions, only to renew the threat when talks stalled, saying it would target the upstream and downstream sectors of Nigeria's oil and gas industry.


Monday, 31 March, 2008, 17:45 GMT  | last updated: Monday, 31 March, 2008, 18:03 GMT

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