FRIDAY- 12th November, 2021: Workers of the International Breweries plc, makers of Trophy lager beer, on Tuesday began an indefinite strike over management refusal to withdraw letters of promotion with caveat which states that upon the acceptance of letter of promotion , the workers gratuity stops with that effect.
Insider sources told CEOAFRICA that a meeting held between CWC members, Food, Beverages & Tobacco Senior Staff Association (FOBTOB) and the parent company Anheuser-Busch InBev (AB InBev) management at the AFBTE secretariat recently ended in deadlock as the secretary was unable to convince the workers to abort the planned strike.
The source said “the meeting on the Union’s threat to go on strike with FOBTOB and AB-INBEV management at the AFBTE secretariat yesterday ended in deadlock as the secretary tried all he could to convince us to drop
the idea of going on with the planned strike but it did not work.
“we are waiting for the branch officers to get to their various units before we give them the go ahead. The management were of the opinion that they cannot withdraw the letters of promotion which have a caveat on acceptance that your gratuity stops immediately.
“we asked them to remove the caveat but they refused and we had to end the meeting abruptly.”
Efforts by CEOAFRICA to get the response of the management on the strike proved futile as the Executive Secretary, Association of Food, Beverage and Tobacco Employers (AFBTE), Adewale Jones said he will not speak to the press on the matter.
As of today 12th NOV, workers in the AB-INDEV plants in Port-Harcourt, Onitsha and Sagamu had also joined in the strike
It will be recalled that in November 2019, Anheuser-Busch InBev (AB-InBev) the parent company of International breweries injected N123bn (US$339m) into the breweries operations, committing to participate fully in the new capital raising exercise.
AB InBev took operational management control of the breweries in 2012 from Castle Group whom previously acquired majority shareholding from Warsteiner Group in 2008.
