Ericsson Nigeria, the local subsidiary
of the global telecommunications solutions provider, has disengaged
about 160 permanent and outsourced workers in its Network Operating
Centre, investigations have shown.
It was gathered that disengagement,
which takes effect on Sunday, December 4, 2016, affected 55
full-time
employees of the company.
According to sources in the company,
some workers were laid off in July when the offshoring (the practice of a
company in one country arranging for people in another country to do
work for it) of jobs to India began.
Findings show that foreign workers had
been recruited to replace the disengaged workers, and knowledge transfer
by Nigerian engineers to the new workers was ongoing in the company’s
office in India.
Sources revealed that the knowledge
transfer had been going on since last year when some Indians were
brought into the country to study the management of telecommunications
infrastructure in the country.
A copy of the disengagement letter to
the permanent workers signed by the Managing Director of the company,
Johan Jemdahi, and obtained by our correspondent, reads, “Please be
informed that effective December 4, 2016, your position has been
declared redundant. We thank you for all your past services to Ericsson.
Further information about the redundancy benefits will be communicated
to you before the actual termination date.”
Findings showed that in the last two and
half years, Ericsson Nigeria had managed the MTN network majorly from
its pool of local workers, some of who were former MTN employees, as
well as other contracted workers.
One of the affected workers said that
the company was offering the jobs, which involved the monitoring of MTN
masts and networks in the country, to Indians at reduced costs.
The workers expressed fears that this
would be a continuous trend in the telecommunications industry if it was
not addressed by the government.
The employee, who spoke on condition of
anonymity, said, “The company said it was cheaper for the work to be
done in India than in Nigeria. The monitoring of those masts can be done
from anywhere. We monitor Abuja, Enugu, Asaba, and Port Harcourt sites
from the Lagos office. What they are now proposing is that instead of
monitoring from Lagos, they want to monitor from India.
“They have taken the Airtel NOC office
to India. They brought about 30 Indians to Nigeria last year to come and
understudy the MTN network and after a month, they went back and
started monitoring from there. There are no plans to pay compensation to
the outsourced workers in the company.”
The Public Relations Manager,
Sub-Saharan Africa, Ericsson, Toju Egbebi, who confirmed the development
to our correspondent, said the move was part of the company’s global
cost and efficiency programme to achieve a net annual cost savings of
Swedish Krona 9bn, adding that the programme would continue till 2017.
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