Chantier Naval workers threaten strike over eight months of unpaid salaries.

The disgruntled workers who are demanding the payment of several other benefits have promised to embark on the industrial action should management of the Douala-based state-run company fail to address their worries within ten days.

In a letter dated Friday January 12 and addressed to the Director General of Chantier Naval, the workers via the leaders of their trade unions, bared their minds.

They wrote: “Considering the difficulties faced by General Management in paying salaries to its employees since November 2022; Considering the non-payment of 13th month in 2023 which should be paid before the end of the year; Considering that salaries for May, June, July, August, September, October, November and December 2023 have not been paid to date; Considering the absence of social dialogue between General Management, Chantier Naval et Industriel Du Cameroun, CNIC staff delegates and trade unions. Considering that this situation has deprived our children of going to school, and of spending a good end-of-year holiday in 2023. Considering a resurgence of activity from June 2023 to the present day in our various sites, albeit dilapidated, docks; Considering the extraordinary general assemblies of the unions held on 05/01/2024 at the Douala and Limbe sites, approving the strike notice. We, the CNIC Trade Unions, hereby demand the full payment of our wages within ten (10) calendar days”.

The irate workers are demanding their salaries for the months of May, June, July, August, September, October, November and December 2023.

They are also requesting the repayment of all deductions made on behalf of CNPS since May as well as the payment of family allowances by CNPS.

Amongst other things, the workers are asking management to ensure “the return of health insurance, May 1st 2021 sewing fees (5,000frs per agent); repayment of all union deductions”.

They are blunt that: “Failing to do this, we will be obliged to observe an unlimited work stoppage at all Chantier Naval sites until our demands are fully met at the end of the present notice period”.

The workers immediately warned that: “Failure to this, we will be obliged to observe an indefinite work stoppage in all CNIC sites until our demands are fully met”.

Chantier Naval not new to strikes

Since 2008 when Zaccheus Forjindam was fired from the post of General Manager of the company, things have never been the same again.

To date, Chantier Naval has had several General Managers including Antoine Bikoro Alo’o, South Korea’s Moo Kwi Ho, Bernard Bayiha, Seoung-Rok Yang, Alfred Forgwei Mbeng and now Roland Maxime Aka’a Ndi’i.

But the series of protests at Chantier Naval are unending, making observers wonder, what has become of the institution after Zaccheus Mungwe Forjindam.

From a turnover of FCFA 400 billion in the days of Forjindam, Chantier Naval is struggling to get a FCFA 3 billion.

Unending protests

In January 2018, the company terminated the employment contracts of 270 employees for financial reasons. 

A recovery plan rolled out by the executive board of Chantier Naval to be implemented between 2015 and 2017, has still not helped matters. 

The said plan includes a social component which is aimed at reducing the number of employees for an adequacy with the normal level of activities of shipyards.

On March 16, 2021, workers of the company downed their tools demanding 13 months of unpaid salaries and emoluments.

In November 2018, former temporary workers of the Shipyard Engineering Company took their protest over years of unpaid arrears to the esplanade of the Prime Minister’s Office.

In fact, hardly has a year gone by without news of strike actions at Chantier Naval. It is either former workers or current workers staging protests demanding financial benefits.

In March 2012, 30 demonstrators, part of a group of 350 former workers of Chantier Naval, who were due to be paid separation bonuses after they were retrenched some years back, stormed the company in protest. 

Following a series of crisis meetings, the company agreed to pay the 350 former temporary workers some 525 million FCFA.

The Guardian Post understands that over 1,200 former temporary workers had demanded retrenchment benefits, but the authorities said only 350 qualified. 

The rest were disqualified during a pre-selection exercise on grounds that their documents were not authentic. 

Most of them were recruited during the reign of the sacked and imprisoned former General Manager, Zacheus Fornjindam, currently serving a life jail term for embezzling public funds.