The Presiding Judge, Owerri Judicial Division of the National Industrial Court, Hon. Justice Nelson Ogbuanya has granted an order of Interlocutory Injunction restraining the Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) either by itself or by its members, affiliates, agents, privies, associates, servants and or any person howsoever acting for or on behalf of the Union from proceeding or embarking on any industrial action or other acts of interfering, disturbing, disrupting, stopping and or shutting down Spie Services Nigeria Ltd daily operations and maintenance of AKPO FPSO oil and gas industry installation pending the hearing and determination of the substantive suit.

Justice Ogbuanya held that Spie Services Nigeria Ltd has made a good case against the Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) deserving judicial intervention and protection by way of Order of Interlocutory Injunction.

The applicants- Spie Services Nigeria Ltd had submitted that it has a subsisting legal right that is being threatened; and that there are triable issues in the dispute between the parties.

From facts, the Claimant/Applicant- had filed the Motion Ex-Parte for Interlocutory Injunction along with the suit, was however, not granted, but the Court directed that PENGASSAN be put on notice and ordered an accelerated Hearing of the suit.

Upon the Defendant’s response to the suit, the Court cautioned the parties not to take any step against the res in the substantive suit. However, at the resumed proceedings for the Hearing of the suit, the learned Claimant’s counsel, drew the attention of the Court to the recent development on the matter, lamenting that the Union, despite being in Court litigating the issue in dispute between the parties, had taken adverse step overreaching the subject matter of the suit.

Counsel submitted that his client has a subsisting contract to manage and operate an Oil & Gas facility offshore which has been operating smoothly without any problem until sometime last year when PENGASSAN wrote a letter issuing an ultimatum threatening to stop all operations on that facility if they are not allowed to make membership of the workers of the labour contractor of the Applicant.

In defence, the defendant- PENGASSAN argued that there was no basis for the Application, and contended that the suit was speculative. Counsel pointed out that part of what the Court would consider is the Applicant’s conduct, as the Claimant/Applicant had refused the Union to exercise its right to unionize the workers operating at the Company’s facility, being the umbrella union in the oil &gas industry in Nigeria. Counsel urged the Court to refuse the Application and dismiss same for lacking merit.

In a well-considered ruling, the Presiding Judge, Justice Nelson Ogbuanya held that the Claimant has demonstrated that its legal right in the subsisting contract and business operation at the Oil and Gas facility is under threat by the PENGASSAN continued threat of industrial action and actual blockade of access to the facility.

The Court stated that the overt threat and apprehension by the Claimant/Applicant has been heightened in the face of “exh. A and B’, confirming the official directive of the Union and follow-up action, which if not restrained, would overreach the contractual rights of the Applicant in the said AKPO FSPO facility, while parties are still litigating their dispute in Court.

Justice Ogbuanya held that PENGASSAN’s assertion on whether the union has the right to unionize the workers operating in the facility under the purview of the Union, which also forms the fulcrum of the substantive dispute between the parties herein, cannot at this interlocutory stage, take any step to preempt such an issue in dispute, as interlocutory stage is not an arena to pry into the substantive dispute of the parties.

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