The Oil Tanker Drivers branch of the National Union of Oil and Natural Gas Workers has threatened to go on strike on Monday over what they described as illegal activities and arrogance by security agents.
PTD said security officials, particularly the union’s Port Harcourt-area military task force, had been making it difficult for tanker drivers to function in the area.
National, PTD-NUPENG Chairman Lucky Osesua told reporters in Abuja that men from the military task force operating in Port Harcourt burned two trucks carrying high-content fuel oil, also known as black oil, on Tuesday by the night.
He said the truckers were falsely accused of transporting crude oil, adding that the trucks, which lifted the black oil at a modular refinery, the Walter Smith refinery and Ibigwe Imo State petrochemical company, on Monday and Tuesday, were intercepted between Ahoada and Elele in Rivers. Express.
Osesua gave the license plates of the trucks as EFR 770 XA and AFZ 351 ZY. He said each of the vehicles was carrying 40,000 liters of black oil to Bob & Sea Depot, Koko, Delta State.
He said the drivers of the two trucks were polite in their responses and presented all the necessary documents to the military officials, who ignored the documents, rejected the appeals and burned the trucks.
The PTD president said, “The drivers presented waybills, NUPENG receipts and quality control documents. But the military continued to insist that they were carrying crude oil.
“They took the two trucks and burned them between Ahoada and Elele in Rivers State Tuesday night.
“Without investigation, without reaching the refinery, where the drivers mentioned that they lifted the black oil, the soldiers burned the trucks in less than five hours.”
Osesua said the documents were signed by Walter Smith Refinery and Petrochemical Manager Charles Okon, indicating where the products were loaded.
He said the union had made the decision to stop lifting in its Port Harcourt area, adding that the same decision would be made on Monday to stop lifting across the country, except that damage incurred as a result of the high-handedness of the military task force were directed.
“Enough about the arbitrariness of our security agents. They should stop demonizing our union and persecuting our men who are doing their normal job,” said the PTD president.
He added: “We hope that in this modern world, trained security officers will be able to identify black oil versus crude oil. We should not be on the receiving end of their ignorance.”
Osesua further hinted that in a desperate move to clean up their actions, the soldiers mobilized scrap collectors in sight of the burned trucks.
