Banks’ casual workers are not their employees, says ASSBIFI President

The ASSBIFI president, in explaining why fraud exists in banks, say: “The casual worker is coming to duty that the job is temporary, there is no security, etc so it is easy for them to be used as trojan horse.”

Eberechi Obinagwam

President, Association of Senior Staff of Banks, Insurance and Financial Institutions (ASSBIFI), Comrade Oyinkan Mosunmola Olasanoye has disclosed that almost all the casual workers in the financial sector are not employees of the bank, rather they are employees of outsourcing companies..

She made this emphasis in a press conference on the state of industry in the financial sector while fielding questions from newsmen on the assumption that 50% of frauds in the country are being carried out by lay off staff from the bank.

“I disagree with the report that 50% of frauds in the nation are from lay off staff from the banks. If you look at Nigeria as a nation that is endowed with integrity and high intelligent. But our ability to marry integrity with intelligence is a problem, the reason being that majority of those that work in financial sectors at least 60 to 70% of them are not full time staff. They are casual workers. Until the labour law is adjusted properly it will still make room for casualisations because it is the same minister of labour that monitors and controls the unionism with employers is the same people that are licensing this outsourcing company,” the ASSBIFI president said.

She pointed out that it is not the same professionalism and the same ethics that full-time bring to duty that the casual workers are coming with.

“The casual worker is coming to duty that the job is temporary, there is no security, etc so it is easy for them to be used as trojan horse. They don’t have the same training that we have,” she said.

The ASSBIFI president added: “For a normal banker, we are trained that ‘Naira’ are tools we work with. We never see them as money. But for somebody that does not have this training that you just bring him and he starts working in the ATM. No entitlement is being given to him and he closes at the same time as a full-time employee? That is the challenge because they can be used.”

She stressed that though we have more casual workers not all of them lack integrity, ”Majority of them are good”

”And we have agreed that instead of bringing people outside, they should pick people from the outsourcing firm and one of the banks picked about 800 last week from the casual workers and made them full-time workers.

“We are also discussing with the Honorable Minister of Labour that there should be a regulation in place. A policy that will guide casual workers and casualization in the financial sector until all these policies are put in place, they may be,” the ASSBIFI president said.

Speaking on the issue of forex that it is being blamed for increasing inflation, the ASSBIFI president said:

“It is not only the forex that is increasing inflation, inflation is a demand and supply thing. As long as our economy depends on foreign production of goods, there will be little that the country can do.

“We lack social security and zero welfare. Before the working-age falls, one has no hope from the government and that is why they have been increasing some of these sharp unnecessary practices in the country because people are afraid of what they will eat tomorrow, but if there is a little amendment in our system like in education, health, and manpower, then there will be little of our demand for minimum wage.”