Union opposes NHF deductions at Honda, TATA

The Automobile, Boatyards, Transport, Equipment and Allied Senior Staff Association at its quarterly National Executive Council meeting has strongly condemned the National Housing Fund deductions from the hard earned salary of its members.
The Automobile Senior Staff Association frowned at the recent legal threats of the Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria to the Management of Honda Manufacturing in particular, with the aim of compelling compulsory deductions to the NHF.
It reiterated its earlier position, made known by its General Secretary, Comrade Sola Olorunfemi, that it was opposed to the move.
Olorunfemi said “We had never subscribed to the policy of compulsory deduction of NHF in the Automobile Industry, and even at the level of our Central Labour Movement -TUC we don’t want any of our members to participate because it has never yielded positive results.”
According to Olorunfemi, although there was a tripartite agreement among the Trade Union Congress, Nigeria Labour Congress and the FMBN, most of the companies operating in the Organized Private Sector are not bound by this agreement as many of AUTOBATE members already have their own houses or pay for other housing schemes,.
It therefore said deductions for the NHF will be burdensome.
In the same vein, AUTOBATE noted with disappointment the report of continual deductions for the housing scheme from its members at Tata Africa Services without considering their opinion.
“AUTOBATE urges the management to stop further deduction and quickly make refund payment where necessary because it is against the collective interest of workers,” the union said.
The issue of National Housing Scheme policy of the Federal Government has been in place since 1992 by NHF Act compelling the workers to contribute about 2.5 per cent of their basic salary to housing.
However, the implementation had failed to meet with the demands of the Nigerian workers, making many private organizations opt out of the scheme.
The AUTOBATE National Secretariat stated that coming from the background of past failure, its members are skeptical about the housing scheme and it was the resolution of its National Executive Council in 2010 that none of its branches should participate again in such a scheme.
The AUTOBATE NEC warned that the management of Honda Manufacturing and Tata Africa Services should henceforth desists from deducting any money from the workers’ salary because it will amount to fraud.