Wigwe And Access Bank's Hypocrisy

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Just days after an online broadcast by the MD/CEO to members of staff on the bank's future pathway as it relates to the global coronavirus pandemic, Access Bank began the drastic intimation of the anticipated dismissal by issuing sack letters to affected workers. These affected workers, numbering over hundred are mostly outsourced staff and constitute over 75% of the entire bank's workforce.

Understandably, and as deduced from the content of that online chat, the economic downturn faced by many businesses/institutions around the world and orchestrated by the deadly viral pandemic has not provided the needed ground for business sustainability, and from which very well, Access Bank is not inured. World over, the presence of Covid-19 and the pulled up restrictions in social interactions it has caused has had biting effects on everything business and everything economy. Livelihoods are been stalled and lives badly affected.

Patronage are on a standstill and businesses are closing shops or barely selling, and the ordinary impact where people are relieved of jobs and asked to stay at home have led to a further more filing for unemployment status. America, Germany, Italy, the UK, etc, the story is the same; of economy in shambles and people retreating to a rather unfortunate but highly advised joblessness, trying just to survive on stimulus packages.

The situation is not different here in Nigeria, both as it concerns the Covid-19 imposed lockdown and the consequential effects of the lockdown nay the virus. The prevailing situation is a global one and Nigeria, being a part of the global framework, aptly shares in all. The coronavirus disease, the economic downturn and the trickling implications are all feelings that Nigerians equally share in and obviously cannot deny.

And when in hushed voices, indications of possible job losses in Nigeria were mused, they were not waved aside simply because those suggestions were themselves probable occurrences going by the global reality of the moment. Specifically and clearly, it wasn't something of a surprise when eventually it turned out that Access Bank was beginning to live out the fears by the very dismissal it has to issue to some of its working members. It wasn't surprising at all, even though the step taken was baffling.

How could a company that just recently dolled out a whooping 1billion naira to the Federal Government of Nigeria hinge its mass retrenchment on paucity of fund? This beats my imagination, and it simply baffles me! That huge amount was given as corporate support to cushion the ravaging impact of the Covid-19 pandemic in the country. Personally, I'd admit there's nothing bad with such step; at best, it is one noble act that ought to be encouraged. But what seems to be ironical, and one boldly brought to the fore by this recent turn of events, is on how a company that knew it was lacking in funds (or rather knew that its action of donating a billion naira largesse would place it in a palpable situation of lack) do so in the first instance.

Except something is not rightly explained, why would some loyal staff members, whose comfort in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic and the attendant implications of lockdown and economic instability relies heavily in the benefits for which their offer of services to this financial institution brings be made to be the scapegoats in an action that's taken with a clear understanding of its (worsening) implication. And for me, in the interim, nothing explains this better than a grand hypocrisy.

Indeed, it's hypocritical for Herbert Wigwe and the company he superintends as MD/CEO to have lavishly given out the sum of 1billion naira, which they're oblivious of how it could be accounted and turn around in just a stroke and hand a slapping dismissal to its members that have committed energy and time to the fortune they'd be denied. It's the height of corporate insensitivity, one that cannot be explained away by the understandably underlying global reality, which Wigwe and his Access would seek to hold as bait for this action.

A letter of dismissal at this point in time, when the least incoming resources is appreciated is the most unfortunate and most inhuman gift. Such rationalization is senseless and insensitive especially when borne from an action that's hypocritical and self-serving. Herbert Wigwe and Access Bank must find a better and more suitable reasons to give in rationalizing this act of betrayal meted to such a huge number of their workforce. Hinging same upon their brandished rationale is not only deceptive but callous!

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