By our reporter 17-5-2025
The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) Lagos chapter said Dangote Refinery hiring of 89 northern youths was a security and economic risk to the host community of the refinery located in Ibeju-Lekki, Lagos State.
On Friday a viral online video showed a gathering of many youths who claimed to have come from Katsina State to work at the Dangote Refinery as labourers. Concerned by their appearance in the community resident had alerted the police.
Lagos State police spokesperson CSP Benjamin Hundeyin, said the police visited the scene when the video was brought to its attention.
Following the “swift deployment of officers” to the scene on May 14, 2025, the police determined that the individuals were “recruited to work as labourers” at the “Dangote Refinery” in Lekki.
A contractor affiliated with the refinery told the police he had “personally arranged for the workers’ relocation” from Katsina for “legitimate employment purposes.”
But NLC Lagos chairperson Comrade Funmi Sessi is not amused by the development: “My position is that what the Dangote Refinery did is very wrong.
“These people are low-income earners. The rule of engagement and labour rules have stated clearly that 70 per cent of those in the locality should be given the opportunity while 30 per cent can be given to those who have skills.
“Which kind of skills will they tell us that these people have that the young people who are unemployed in the locality don’t have? Which competence don’t those people in the community have? This is an aberration.
“I believe Dangote can’t do this. He has companies in all parts of this country; why couldn’t he recruit these guys for his company in the northern part and reserve these ones for those in the South, where the refinery is situated?”
“Those guys should be taken back to Dangote’s companies in the northern part, not in Lagos State. If Dangote refuses to do this, we will involve the NLC at the national level to fight this act of bringing 89 unskilled workers to Lagos State.
This is unacceptable to us.
“This is the first series of it. We are also using this opportunity to tell the government of Lagos State and the Federal Ministry of Labour that Dangote has committed an aberration of the highest order.”
