Vice President Kashim Shettima has forcefully entered the VP Shettima Dangote PENGASSAN Dispute, declaring at the Nigerian Economic Summit 2025 that Nigeria is greater than the Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN). This statement intensifies the high-stakes confrontation between the oil workers’ union and the Dangote Refinery over the mass dismissal of its workers.
The crisis began when the Dangote Refinery, a $20 billion facility, fired an estimated 800 workers, alleging they engaged in acts of sabotage and unionisation. PENGASSAN countered, claiming the mass termination was an illegal infringement on the workers’ constitutional right to unionize (Internal Link: Right to Unionize in Nigeria), and swiftly launched a nationwide solidarity strike. The union’s action led to the disruption of gas and crude supply to the refinery, causing national losses in oil production and a drop in power generation.
Speaking in Abuja, VP Shettima emphasized the 650,000-barrel-per-day refinery’s critical importance, noting it “must be supported at all costs to succeed.” He lauded Aliko Dangote as “an institution” who chose to invest in Nigeria, stating, “If he had invested in Microsoft, in Amazon, or in Google, he probably might be worth $70 to $80 billion by now.”
The Vice President urged caution and patriotism, criticizing the industrial action for potentially “holding the whole nation to ransom because of a minor labour dispute.” He stressed that the VP Shettima Dangote PENGASSAN Dispute threatens an asset financed by local and foreign debt, asserting, “Nigeria is greater than PENGASSAN. Nigeria is greater than each and every one of us.”
PENGASSAN Fires Back
In an immediate counter-response, Festus Osifo, the National President of PENGASSAN, firmly rejected the Presidency’s characterization of the dispute. He asserted that the nation was bigger than the Dangote Group and the Presidency as well. Osifo confirmed that the union suspended its recent strike only after a Federal Government-brokered agreement mandated the redeployment of the sacked workers to other subsidiaries within the Dangote conglomerate.
However, Osifo was clear: PENGASSAN maintains its mandate to protect its members’ jobs and will repeat the industrial action if the company breaches the agreement again. The intense fallout from the VP Shettima Dangote PENGASSAN Dispute highlights the tightrope walk between protecting massive private investment and upholding workers’ rights in Nigeria’s crucial energy sector (Outbound Link: NNPC Report on Strike Losses). .
The video titled Nigeria Greater Than PENGASSAN – Shettima Speaks On Rift With Dangote Refinery provides visual context and direct commentary on the Vice President’s controversial remarks that form the core of this article.
