Due to alleged illegal tax deductions, employees of the Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas, or NLNG, Train 7 project have started a protest in Bonny, Bonny Local Government Area, Rivers State.
Fitters and welders apparently started the demonstration, which was organized by Daewoo Contractors employees, and then it spread to junior employees.
The results show that for the previous two years, each employee has been required to pay around N150,000 per month in taxes.
The irate employees, however, claim that NLNG has not yet provided them with their Tax Identification Numbers, or TINs, in spite of the deductions made during the previous two years.
Additionally, they asserted that an audit revealed irregularities demonstrating that taxes were never sent to the federal government in spite of the monthly deductions.
The employees are therefore requesting that their TINs be released and that the money that has been withheld over the past two years be returned.
After repeated demands for explanation were not addressed, a pipe welder who was one of the protesting workers, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that the protest started on Monday.
He continued by saying that despite the company’s request that employees designate representatives for communication, the agreements made at those talks have not been put into effect.
One of the demonstrators also charged that their union was compromising the matter, claiming that union executives had known about it for two years but had kept quiet because they were profiting from the “illegal taxation.”
Details will be added soon.
