The National Union of Air Transport Employees (NUATE) has refuted claims that the sacked Nigerian staff of Turkish Airlines were involved in $600,000 air ticket racketeering.

The aviation union described the allegations that they picketed the airline in defense of the workers’ wrongdoing as blatant and poorly formulated lies.

Debunking the $600,000 ticket sales racketeering claims, the union explained, “What happened is that sometime in April 2023, Turkish Airlines’ headquarters issued a sales restriction circular which allowed sales of only two premium classes of tickets as a response to foreign airlines’ difficulty in repatriating their proceeds to home countries due to foreign exchange constraints in Nigeria.

“But, in a contradictory manner, the airline had an advertised fare on the website which was much lower than the permitted fares. Therefore, intending passengers who accessed such fare, but could not pay online, were directed by the global call centre to approach the Nigerian offices.

“As the workers could not attend to the customers due to the sales restriction, the passengers resorted to creating ugly scenes at the sales offices, which became riotous at times.

“As an image-saving measure, the then sales manager asked the sales staff to use the PNR obtained online by the customers to process the tickets if the airline’s booking system could route the tickets. The sales staff simply complied. As a matter of fact, the then sales manager, a Turkish national, sold these tickets too, confirming that this was the local management’s approved approach to resolving the problem created by the website.

“The airline’s accountants received all due monies from all tickets sold, and all sales reports were daily submitted to the sales manager, signed by him and the accounts department, and scanned to HQ. If monies were not fully received, the account would not have balanced, and sales could not have been concluded.”

They therefore declared that no monies belonging to Turkish Airlines are missing and no staff has taken any monies belonging to Turkish Airlines. Importantly, no staff had any pecuniary benefit from the so-called internet sales.

“It is, therefore, disingenuous for the General Manager to hold the workers to the charge of failure to comply with the sales restrictions when it is clear that shortcomings on the part of the airline’s ICT (on the website), combined with local management’s decisions on managing an otherwise ugly situation, were responsible for the sales in question,” they stressed.

They noted that while the Nigerian staff have been dismissed, the Turkish Sales Manager has been promoted and redeployed, and the ICT of the airline has faced no charges. They suggested this as an example of racism.

NUATE further debunked claims that it fully participated in the disciplinary committee that tried the workers, saying during the disciplinary hearing, the union made it clear that the committee could only be used as a fact-finding means as it was not formed in conformity with the negotiated Conditions of Service.

Describing the court that tried the staff as a kangaroo court, they said the General Manager who issued queries to the staff and decided that their responses were unacceptable was the same person who set up the committee and chaired it. They argued that under such circumstances, it was practically impossible to have a fair hearing or justice, as can be seen from the outcome. The union’s position was conveyed to the management in writing at the time.

The union alleged that since the General Manager assumed office in May 2023, he has employed subterfuge and strong-arm tactics to create a hostile and toxic atmosphere in the Turkish Airlines workplace.

“He has used threats, intimidation, and blackmail to induce fear among the workers to force them to worship him as a demi-god,” they said.

“As example, he exhumed so-called ADMs (debit notes) against employees that are untenable, thereby slamming huge debits against most of the employees. He calls workers to his office privately to compel them to agree to his terms, failing which he threatens to sack, police/court actions, and image tarnishing.

“He allegedly locked the workers out of their work systems and workstations, thereby rendering them redundant as a means of breaking their will and causing psychological damage. He has withheld the earned 2023 bonuses of affected workers, amounting to millions of naira, as economic warfare against the workers. He casts unsavoury glances and makes uncomplimentary remarks against workers even along corridors in the workplace.

“These and other coercive actions on the part of General Manager have seriously and negatively impacted the mental health of all staff of the airline, causing a number of them to cave in to the General Manager’s demands to resign without any benefit and forfeiting over ten years of service. A particular pregnant staff member nearly lost her pregnancy after an encounter with the GM and was hospitalised for some time to stabilise.

“This level of wickedness to one’s staff is definitely abnormal.”

On the restraining court order against the union’s picketing of the airline, they said the main reason for the sack of seven out of eleven employees under these trumped-up charges is the continued determination to eliminate the union from the airline, which started in 2020 when it sacked all the members of the airline’s Branch Executive Council of the Union, a matter that it has refused to rectify to date.

NUATE emphasised that the high-handedness, plain wickedness, and undiluted arrogance of Mr. Lokman Balkan, the General Manager of Turkish Airlines in Lagos, make him totally unfit to hold such an important position as managing people. He has demonstrated total disdain for Nigerians and Nigerian laws – even aviation laws.