The Air Transport Services Senior Staff Association of Nigeria(ATSSSAN) has advised Federal Government agencies, companies and organisations operating in the Nigeria’s aviation sector to collaborate and engage in fruitful discussions with aviation unions to ensure that their operations and activities are not disrupted..
The President of ATSSSAN, Comrade John Ogbe gave the advice when he and his executives paid a courtesy visit to the management of the Nigeria Aviation Handling Company (NAHCO) Aviance.
He said ATSSSAN, which is largely made up of senior management staff, take a lot of caution in its actions in dealing with managements stating that the body is open to initiatives that will support the growth of the companies in the industry.
The ATSSSAN President declared that as social partner to organisations, the workers are part of the critical stakeholders and the oil that roll the wheels that create production.
He urged better welfare condition for staff affirming that the current global economic crunch is affecting workers in the country adding that the value of the country’s currency is eroded daily and encourage management to increase workers’ wages.
“We want to support businesses. Our stand basically is very collaborative. As senior management staff, we try to understand with management why recruiting our workers first. We understand too that we cannot over-unionised the system thereby killing the business. We look at the numbers”
“We are your social partners so the apprehension that unions always come for disruptions will not suffice with adequate collaborations between the unions and companies in the industry,” Ogbe said.
While commending NAHCO for its policies on staff welfare, Ogbe said, “When there are issues, we are open to discussions, we also want you to trust our local branches, we trust them to deal with management. They are not here to truncate or disrupt businesses.”
“For us, it is very important for businesses to survive in the aviation industry. We understand how your services are very critical to the survival of other service providers. We are not ready to disrupt or truncate that process,” Ogbe added.
He further commended the company for its investment in equipment and training for staff saying that the development is impressive.
“It is very important, when you have efficient work tools. It reduces pressures on the workers and the investment in this is something that we commend Nahco on and as we say we are open to partnership.”
“The union is not averse to training; there is no end to training so you must continue to train your workers. We encourage you to continue training and when you pay them well, they will not want to go anywhere. We commend the security and continuity of job here in NAHCO. ”
Speaking on behalf of NAHCO, the Group Executive Director, Corporate Services, Dr. Peter Obabori disclosed that the management has schedule a meeting with unions to discuss its staff welfare for Wednesday April 1st.
While he congratulated the new ATSSSAN President, he affirmed that, “We know that the major concern for the unions is to make sure staff wages are fair. Serious work done, fair wages to go with it. And the benefits that staff will get.
“If you look at NAHCO you will see that NAHCO is a fair organisation in terms of wages and treatments of staff, and in terms of other benefits that surround the working environment we are also very fair. And we are pushing for more,” he said.
“We have various incentive that are performance-based bonuses, profits, shares for staff, these are major chunk of cash to goes into the accounts of the staff. Though all these don’t come at once as salary, some of them come at certain circle of the year. We put various palliative measures in place at any point in time we notice a change in the country’s economy just to ensure our staff are not adversely affected.”
“We are already also looking at the current global economic turmoil to ensure that its impact does not affect our staff too much,” Obabori added.
The GED disclosed that “Issues of safety and working condition of staff are very dear to our hearts. We have also acquired equipment with over 20 million dollars to ensure our staff have the right equipment to work. That has brought about a growth in revenue and profit for the company.”
He also stated that due to adequate training of it workforce, about 20 staff of NAHCO have left the company to work with Quartar Airways in Doha.
He advised staff of the company to key into the company’s policy that enable them become co-share owners of the company.
According to him, “The company’s share which is sold for N4 four years ago has jumped to N170 in today’s value. There are opportunities within the company to be rich if you open your eyes well and do the right investment, please don’t miss that opportunity. Please even as it is now start investing in your company, you cannot lose money.” Obabori urged staff.
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