23rd December, 2013
Fifty-two senior bank workers recently sacked by the new Managing Director of Keystone Bank, Philip Ikeazor, have threatened to seek redress in court, if they were not immediately paid their entitlements.
The workers who issued a statement titled: “Sanusi’s Keystone Bank Working Against Jonathan’s Transformation Agenda?” accused the Managing Director of embarking on mass sack to make room for his cronies to come in.
They alleged that there were moves by the Managing Director to renege on the bank’s contractual obligations to them.
“On November 8, 2013,” the statement read, “52 senior staff of grade level between DGM and manager were fired without any reason whatsoever. The manner of disengagement was, to say the least, very crude and humiliating. Some staff were disabled from the system the previous night while others were thrown out while still working. The head of IT was at his desk working when one of his lower level staff was directed to disable him. The chief inspector and some other divisional heads were made to counsel affected staff in their divisions only to discover they have been disabled themselves. This is Ikeazor’s way of rewarding committed and hardworking staff.
The sacked workers maintained that the sack raised questions about corporate governance, adding that if efforts by Lamido Sanusi, Central Bank Governor, to reposition the financial sector are to be realised, Ikeazor must be stopped.
They argued that replacing middle to senior management staff in one fell swoop would make the bank more vulnerable.
The aggrieved workers called on CBN and AMCON to wade into the matter immediately and call Philip Ikeazor to order.
“The recent sack did not come as a surprise because Ikeazor is known to use every opportunity or forum to boast about his powers to fire anybody without any challenge (since the bank is not unionised). Even though the board is not comfortable with mass sack because of the cost implications in terms of pay-off, Ikeazor assured the chairman he could pull it off without paying a dime. We do not know where in the world employees would be forcefully exited without compensation. Perhaps Ikeazor is set to redefine labour laws. To date, no dime has been paid. In fact, he has crashed exited staff loans and liquidated outstanding amounts in Visa and Mastercard accounts into the exited staff current accounts. This has wiped out any balances in such accounts, leaving the affected staff without any means of survival. The Managing Director has also directed that money be illegally swept from spouse and children accounts to offset the debit balances in the current accounts occasioned by the crashing of loans and forced liquidation of credit card accounts.”
The workers added: “To make good his threat not to pay, Ikeazor has directed his divisional heads to cajole the sacked staff to come and resign.”
Pledging not to yield to alleged plan to get them to tender their resignation, the workers dismissed the view that the bank was embarking on mass sack to reduce cost.
“Although Ikeazor wants the world to believe that he is sacking staff to reduce cost, his real motives are very obvious. The head of IT was replaced the following Monday, November 11 by a DGM. The current head of internal control was appointed by Ikeazor and it is certain a new chief Inspector will be engaged soon. We also hear he is shopping for a head of strategy.
“We hereby call on CBN and AMCON to wade into the situation immediately and call Philip Ikeazor to order. Otherwise, all efforts being made since 2009 to revive the bank will amount to nothing,” they stated.