By Harris-Okon Emmanuel - Warri
A Niger Delta group, Niger Delta Indigenous Movement for Radical Change (NDIMRC), has threatened sa total showdown with Nigerian Agip Oil Company (NAOC) in the days ahead over alleged short-changing of Nigerians working in the company.
While imploring President Goodluck Jonathan to prevail on the management of the company to give Nigerians a better deal, the group said it has documents of shoddy deals allegedly involving the Vice Chairman /Managing Director of Agip, Mr. Ciro Pagano, that could send him to jail.
The group condemned a situation where major positions in the company were in the hands of foreigners to the detriment of Nigerians and vowed to stage protest at all the installations and offices of the company in Abuja and Port Harcourt as well as expose the alleged dirty oil deal of the vice chairman/ managing director of the company, Mr. Ciro Pagano. The group then urged President Jonathan to prevail on the management of the company to change its attitude towards Nigerians or ‘‘risk a very tough time in the days ahead,’’ adding that “President Jonathan must call Agip to order now; otherwise we will cripple the activities of the company across the country with well planned protests.” These are contained in a statement signed by its President, Nelly Emma; Secretary, John Sailor, and Public Relations Officer, Mukoro Stanley, decrying that Nigerians working in Agip were being treated like slaves and denied choice managerial positions in their land and threatened to disrupt the activities of the company unless something urgent was done to redress the ugly trend. The statement reads in part: “Our investigations have shown that Nigerians are not well treated in Agip; they are being denied key positions in the company. For instance, the General Manager (Finance) is an Italian; the General Manager (Upstream Business) Italian; the General Manager (Gas Business) Italian; the General Manager (Commercial) Italian; the General Manager (District) Italian and General Manager (Projects) Italian.
“Our findings revealed that only the positions of General Manager (Legal), General Manager (Public Affairs), General Manager Nigerian Content Development (NCD) and General Manager (Human Resources) are being held by Nigerians and we think this is not good enough for the Nigerian Local Content and people of the oil-rich Niger Delta region. “We are of the strong view that Nigerians ought to be given the positions of the General Manager (Projects); General Manager (Gas Business); General Manager (Finance) and General Manager (Upstream Business), the maltreatment and short-changing of Nigerians by management of the company is a great concern to us and it must stop. It is clear that the Vice Chairman/Managing Director of the company, Mr. C. Pagano, who we will not hesitate to expose his dirty deal to the pubic, do not want our people to hold key positions in the company; but we are not going to accept this broad day robbery of our people.