Airtel Denies Sacking Staff

Embattled telecommunications firm, Airtel Nigeria Ltd, has denied sacking any staff as widely reported in the media recently.

The company was believed to have sacked 3,000 of its call centre staff resulting in a face-off between it and Nigerians including the National Assembly, the Nigeria Labour Congress and the Lagos State House of Assembly.

Addressing members of the Lagos State House of Assembly Tuesday morning, Airtel Human Resources Manager, Jubril Saba explained that it was 1500 Nigerians who were employed by two agencies including Tech Mahindra, an outfit responsible for managing Airtel Call Centres in Nigeria that were affected.

He further said they were not directly employed by Airtel but were supplied by Spanco Channel BPO Limited to Tech Mahindra on contract basis and that the contract had expiration term.

He said his company was involved because Tech Mahindra managed the calls from Airtel customers.

Saba said: “we did not sack anybody, not even one person. The agents who were reportedly dismissed were not Airtel employees. What happened was that, some of the call centre agents that work for our partners, Tech Mahindra and Spanco Channel have contracts that expired on Friday, 30 September, and our partners decided not to renew their contracts.

“But we were surprised when the news came up that Airtel sacked its staff in order to accommodate foreigners. These people that were affected were not our employees, but they provide services for Airtel.

“We are concerned about the welfare of our people and if 1,535 people are laid off from work, we know what negative implication it would have on the country.

“So that is why we met with Tech Mahindra and Spanco Channel BPO Limited and informed them that they should recall those affected workers.”

While expressing satisfaction at his explanation, the House appealed that the company should make good its promise to reinstate the workers while it continued with the task of rendering quality service to customers.

By Eromosele Ebhomele