PDO employees in Oman demand dismissal of trade union

A large number of the Petroleum Development Oman (PDO) employees are up in arms demanding dismissal of the current Trade Union in the government-owned oil company. "Over 1,000 employees have signed a memorandum given to the Manpower Minister," Tarek Al Sabahi, an employee spearheading the demand for change in union at the PDO, told Gulf News. A founder-member of the current union has also pointed an accusing finger at the current president of the union for not working in the interests of 5,000 plus employees. "The president of our union is on a sabbatical leave for nearly one year but has not bothered to inform the union members about his absence from the company," Faiz Al Sharji , founder-member and PDO employee for over two decades, told Gulf News. He also accused the President (Soud Al Jabri) of serving his own interests while holding on to the top post at the PDO Trade Union. "He (Al Jabri) heads the General Trade Union Federation in the country and also serves on Human Rights Commission, so our (PDO employees) interests are completely ignored," said Al Sharji. He said that the union has hardly 200 registered members. "The union is dormant and we want to make it active again so that workers' demands could be put forward legitimately," he pointed out. He said that going by the Trade Union laws in the country the current PDO union had lost its legitimacy for contravening several regulations. The long-time PDO employee said that under the Trade Union laws, a company union must hold General Body Meeting annually. "We haven't had General Body Meeting so far thus the union has lost legal ground for representing the workers," reckons Al Sharji. More than 1,000 employees have signed the memorandum given to the Manpower Minister, demanding fresh elections to the PDO Employees Trade Union. "We want Manpower Ministry to derecognise the current union and let us hold elections to elect new members to represent interest of the all PDO employees," reiterated Al Sabahi, adding that the current union has violated a number of trade union regulations and lost the right to continue. He added that they were waiting for a reply from the Manpower Ministry to their demands. From / Glf News