By Cliffsimeon Akalonu
The Maritime Workers Union of Nigeria (MWUN) has engaged leading asset management company; ARM Pensions in order to improve the welfare and living standard of the labour workers.
MWUN Secretariat in Apapa Lagos last week, the President General, Comrade Adewale Adeyanju noted that the scheme was opened to the four branches of the union.
The scheme was widely accepted and commended by the presidents of four branches of the union namely the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) Shipping, Dockworkers and Seafarers branches.
Before assuming position as President General of MWUN, Comrade Adeyanju has demonstrated his commitment to maritime workers welfare, introduced several welfare packages to improve dockworkers welfare, especially the signing of the popular Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) with terminal operators, stevedoring companies and Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) which ultimately increased the salaries of dockworkers.
Comrade Adeyanju described the savings scheme as the workers individual arrangement that does not concern their employers yet. “I believe the scheme would help maritime workers as a whole, it is a scheme I believed in, and I know it is going to work, we have commenced.
“We want to start with the executives first before it is extended to the least workers, the unit and district executives.
This scheme involves all the four branches of MWUN, by next year, we are going to involve all the stakeholders to support the maritime workers, if we had this in the past, the issue of paying somebody N400,000 would not arise”.
“The scheme is outside their gratuity, it is to support their life, it is an individual contribution, but the idea of bringing in the employers would come later”.
Earlier representatives of ARM Pensions at the sensitization took time to educate the workers on how to open various savings plan with the company in other to get something to retire back on after years of work.
