The lock-in of Nigerian workers by Chinese firm

RECENTLY, workers at the Centre South Construction Company (CSCC), a construction company based in Ogun State, were locked in at the firm’s three construction sites for three days (from Friday to Monday morning). According to media reports, CSCC locked in the over 30 workers at the firm’s three construction sites for a period of 72 hours. CSCC is a Chinese firm currently handling the construction of Sango-Ota/Mowe Road. It also has three construction sites at Sango-Ota, Oke-Aro and Mowe, all in Ogun State.

The lock-in, according to the workers who were on a weekend duty, was over an alleged theft of the company’s property at one of its construction sites. According to the workers, the CSCC management also embarked on the punitive action of putting out electricity and water supply in the premises, as a result of which the stranded workers were made to rely on the hawkers passing by the gate to quench their thirst and hunger. What was even more worrisome was that the suspected theft complained of by the company had allegedly occurred at its site at Sango-Ota, yet it went ahead to detain staff who worked in other sites as well.

In a response to the lock-in, Mr Ben Xhen, a senior official of the company, was quoted as saying that the company’s security consultant, Pahek Security Services Limited,  had advised its management to take the punitive approach in order to safeguard its property. The CSCC lock-in of the workers is indeed unfortunate. The story exemplifies the  infractions daily committed by expatriate companies against their Nigerian workers and the near helplessness or sheer indifference of the Nigerian government to this ugly trend. In virtually all these companies, Nigerian workers complain of servitude. The companies treat them like animals.

Apparently banking on the high rate of unemployment in Nigeria, many of these expatriate companies use Nigerians for cheap labour, paying them peanuts and making them to work under very harsh and indeed unhealthy environments. The media is inundated day in, day out by tales of workers in these companies being shepherded to and from work in trucks that should only be used to ferry cattle. Industrial accidents are inflicted on them without corresponding compensation for injuries suffered in the course of their work. The workers also operate under very hostile and even racist environments which assault their humanity.

Sadly, successive governments have turned a blind eye to the servitude of Nigerian workers in these organisations. Rumours have it that these expatriate companies spend huge sums of money as protection money payable  to  top  government officials and  the police. Thus, when the Nigerian workers face any act of impunity by the companies, there is a deliberate effort to shroud their complaints, with the authorities looking the other way. This has lionised the proprietors of the companies who treat their workers as lesser beings who can be trampled upon at any time. Even though the country’s labour laws explicitly frown on servitude in the hands of any company, whether Nigerian or foreign-run, the practice has continued because of the lack of punishment for violators. The Nigerian state has simply abandoned its citizens to their fate in the hands of foreign oppressors.

The CSCC case is one of such cases of abuse of Nigerian workers which are daily singsongs in the expatriate-run companies. Surely, subjecting workers to such mental torture and deprivation of freedom which only a jailhouse confers is an abuse which must not be allowed to stand. We call on the Inspector General of Police and the Minister of Labour to look into the extant case, with the ultimate aim of curbing such unfortunate incidents. We wonder whether the ministry has monitors whose duty is to go from one company to the other and ascertain the level of compliance with Nigeria’s labour laws on the treatment of employees. In the instant case, appropriate punishment must be meted to anyone found to have transgressed the law.