Dipo Olowookere
By Modupe Gbadeyanka
No fewer than 215 workers on its payroll have been sacked by one of the commercial banks in Nigeria, Unity Bank, on Wednesday.
The dismissed workers were those who “achieved less than 40 per cent of their performance target, which affected the lender’s overall profitability in recent years,” The Nation reports.
It was also reported that Unity Bank asked the affected workers to go due part of its reengineering strategy for greater performance.
The development comes on the first day at worker from the two-day public holidays declared by the Federal Government to mark Eid el-Kabir. The workers sacked by the bank were reportedly shocked to be welcomed back with their dismissal letter.
Unity Bank has over 2000 employees in its workforce.
The sack of the 215 staff is also coming when most banks in Nigeria are battling with poor profitability due to harsh economic conditions and heightened business risks from the plunge in crude oil prices.
Also, commercial banks have found it hard to survive due to the introduction of the Treasury Single Account (TSA) implemented by the present administration, which requires them to transfer funds belonging to the government to an account domiciled with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
It was reported that workers fired by Unity Bank cut across all cadres including junior, middle and top management positions.
“About 200 new hires were said to have been recruited by the Bank to drive the transformation initiative began by the Management in the last one year while about 100 other staff were said to have been promoted recently,” Vanguard quoted a source in its report on the development.
Unity Bank, which commenced operations in January 2006 following the merger of nine financial institutions with competences in investment, corporate and retail banking, recently relocated its headquarters from Abuja to Lagos.
Last May, Unity Bank forged a strategic alliance with Black Trituium, equity and investment fund manager and the new investor has injected fresh ideas into the bank.
This has expanded the scope of the financial institution; strengthening its capital base and making it support massive retail banking.
