Eberechi Obinagwam
Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria, (PENGASSAN), and the Nigerian Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas workers (NUPENG), have directed their members to ignore the threat from the office of the Accountant General of the Federation to stop the salaries of their members come October 2019.
The group in a press statement signed by PENGASSAN General Secretary, Comrade Lumumba I. Okugbawa, and the NUPENG counterpart, Comrade Olawale Afolabi, recalled that a circular (OAGF/ IPPIS/1 2t11t77) dated 7th September 2018 was issued on integrated personnel and pay roll information system (IPPIS) which the oil and gas workers fumed at resulting to series of meetings to proffer ways of addressing the matter.
The statement added that at the end of those meetings, a technical committee was set up by the Federal Ministry of Labour and employment to assess the union’s concerns regarding the implementation of IPPIS, which they are yet to meet before the threat.
“We reaffirm that we are not against the Government Policy regarding lPPlS, but we wish to refer to the existence of Government Integrated Financial Management Information System (GlFMlS) platform which is run by the Central Bank of Nigeria which is already serving a similar purpose and the Presidential Initiative on Continuous Audit (PICA) whose responsibility is to audit the nominal and payroll of Agencies as recently emphasized by the Honourable Minister of Finance,” the statement reads.
The group therefore directed its members in NNRA, PTl, DPR, NCDMB, PPPRA, PTDF and PEF not to provide any information concerning their personnel payment and allowances to the Accountant-General’s Office for the purpose of lPPIS, until the Technical Committee meets.
