Nigerian oil union sees strike impacting output by end-week

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Nigerian oil union sees strike impacting output by end-week

BridgeNews and Agence France-Presse Lagos--Nov. 28

Nigeria's main oil sector union said Tuesday it had issued orders to make a day-old pay strike hit hard, threatening oil exports of more than 2 million barrels per day. "We have issued orders. We are mobilizing our forces. We expect to have shown a real effect by the end of the week," Kenneth Narebor, general secretary of the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association (PENGASSAN) said. "Progressively, we are shutting the industry down. It will be completely effective by the end of the week," he said.

The union on Monday announced an indefinite strike in the sector that makes Nigeria the sixth largest oil exporter in the world, supplying one eighth of U.S. oil imports.

Narebor said the union is demanding a pay increase of 45-60% but said this was a negotiating figure. The demand follows increases of 10% for workers at state oil company NNPC and 20% for workers in the fuel marketing sector this year.

A spokesman for the six major foreign oil companies that operate in Nigeria said Tuesday the strike has so far had little effect on exports. But Narebor said work had already stopped from the main loading bay operated by U.S. group Chevron at Escravos in the Niger Delta region.

He said work was starting to be affected at the largest foreign oil operator, Royal Dutch/Shell, in the city of Port Harcourt.

"We only informed our people of the strike on Monday. We got an agreement today on solidarity action from key operations. We are taking it progressively to the (oil) well-heads and export terminals," Narebor said.

However, a spokesman for Shell in Nigeria told Bridge News earlier Tuesday that its crude production and exports remained unaffected by the strike.

"Our production remains at full capacity," the spokesman said.

Shell operates around 800,000 bpd of Nigerian crude production and exports handled at the Bonny and Forcados terminals.

A spokesman for Chevron had also told Bridge News late Monday that exports and production were continuing as normal from the company's Escravos terminal.

http://www.petroleumworld.com/story1524.htm

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), November 28, 2000

Answers

Yikes! A two million barrel a day shortfall would be the shot heard around the world.

-- Uncle Fred (dogboy45@bigfoot.com), November 29, 2000.

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