Angry workers protest sack of EEDC staff, hike in bills in Enugu

HUNDREDS of angry workers of Enugu Electricity Distribution Company (EEDC,) on Monday staged a protest over the march over the arbitrary sacking of staff.

The protesters comprising United Labour Congress (ULC), Trade Union Congress, TUC, National Union of Electricity Employees (NUEE) and Senior Staff Association of Electricity and Allied Companies (SSAEAC), moved round the major streets of Enugu metropolis before stopping at the EEDC office at Okoara Avenue, Abakaliki road Enugu.

Some of the placard read: “we say no to indiscriminate sacking of workers”, “arbitrary and crazy billing, poor working condition, ritual of burning live cows, higher bill, more darkness, no meter for customers should stop.”

The leader of National Union of Electricity Employees, (NUEE) Comrade Joe Ajiero, who spoke on behalf of the protesting workers said that the union was on picketing exercise against the Enugu Electricity Distribution Company (EEDC) for arbitrary sacking of staff.

Ajiero said that the union had met with the required rules before embarking on the picketing action. We wrote the company for a meeting to iron out some issues, but they turned down their request as the law requested that we should write them for two weeks and after the two weeks, we equally gave them another one week which elapsed last week.

“EEDC last week sacked above 400 staff and replaced them with Oraifite people and those that they will be paying N20,000 per month,” he added.

According to him, “EEDC is the worst distribution company in the country that sacks workers, dehumanises workers that work without condition of service.

“They have changed Enugu Electricity Company to Oraifite Electricity Company by sacking workers and replaced them with Oraifite people,” Ajiero pours out.

Also speaking, the leader of Senior Staff Association of Electricity and Applied Company (SSAEAC), Comrade Christian Okonkwo, lamented about the poor management of the company saying that they are not qualified to handle the company.

He said that they are just collecting money from people without delivering the service that people paid for.

“They are not qualified to manage the company. They are just collecting money from people without service,” Okonkwo said.

He urged the government to step in to revive the company (EEDC) as they are not qualified to handle the company.

Reacting to the protest march, the head of communication to the Company, EEDC, Emeka Eze, condemned the protest, saying that they should have embarked on dialogue rather than take to the streets.

“We were greeted this morning by a picket action organised by the Nigerian Union of Electricity Employees (NUEE) across our business areas. The group besieged our offices, drove away our staff, beat up our security personnel at some location and also locked up our offices.

“This is embarrassing to us and surprising too as we have never been averse to the union and its activities. We have been in constant meeting and discussion with the different arms of the labour union on different issues and I think it will be wrong for the NUEE to claim that we have refused to meet with their representatives (there are documentary records/documents to support this).

“EEDC embarked on a restructuring exercise last year, this was brought to the attention of representatives of the union at some of our sessions last year. After this exercise, some job positions were abolished as they were no longer relevant; staff were assessed and some of them that could not defend their position/job were eventually disengaged; while we also hired additional staff to beef up our technical and customer service team.

“The decision of management is in the interest of the organisation and was not in any way meant to witch-hunt any staff; the process was transparent and fair.

“We are a private establishment and under obligation to serve our customers; to do that effectively, we have to survive and remain in business,” he said.