A Citibank employee, Adebisi Omojola, has dragged her employer to court over alleged illegal dismissal, a suit filed by her counsel, Abayomi Alagbada, has revealed.
Alagbada, in suit number NICN/LA/422/2022 led before the National Industrial Court sitting in Lagos, is seeking an Order of Mandatory Injunction to reverse the decision made on November 25, 2022 and restore the claimant back to her position as Assistant General Manager with her salaries and other benefits fully restored.
She was dismissed after a suit was initiated to prevent the action, pending the determination of the originating suit.
Joined in the suit is another employee and the Country Human Resources Officer of Citibank, Gboyega Oloyede, who the claimant had accused of victimization and harassment in her earlier petition to the company and the court.
The 13 paragraph affidavit in support, deposed to by one Eucharia Patrick in the law firm of AAGU Legal, solicitor to the claimant claimed that the court processes commenced on November 4, 2022 and were served on the defendants and respondents.
He said that despite the pendency of the matter, the defendants and respondents on November 25, 2022 sent Omojola a letter via e-mail informing her of the decision of the company to terminate her appointment with immediate effect.
In the affidavit, it was averred that the action is a flagrant disregard to the process of the court.
It was also averred that Omojola is a single mother of three, whose means of livelihood depends on her job and by extension her salary. This she claimed that their survival has now been jeopardized.
Therefore, the claimant is praying the court to compel the reversal of the decision to sack her in interest of justice. The claimed she was employed by the bank in 2013, and have deservedly risen to the position of Assistant General Manager before things fell apart between her and the bank.
Omojola revealed that this was as a result of harassment, intimidation, bully and attempt to force her out of job because of the grouse she is having with the attitude of Oloyede.
She claimed that the unilateral sharing of her medical reports and other private information is a breach of her fundamental rights to privacy as enshrined in the Nigerian constitution and a breach of Data Protection Law.
In an earlier court process, Omojola is seeking the order of the court directing Citibank to assign her to another supervisor, saying she can no longer work with the second defendant.
In addition to this, she also seeking an order directing the first defendant to reinstate her or reconnect her back to all its platforms having not committed any offence or contravened the bank law in any form.
As an alternative, Omojola is claiming a sum of N200,000,000 (Two hundred million naira) in damages against the defendants, N10,000,000 (ten million naira) as cost of litigation and another order directing the payment of all the entitlements accrued to her in the Contract of Employment and Handbook for employees, who are forced out by Citibank.
It was alleged that the bad blood between the claimant and the defendants started sometimes in 2016 when the claimant had issues in her marriage leading to serious medical complications and legal issues. This forced her to be away with her children in Canada.
“The issues with me was brought to the knowledge of the management which gave me support needed at that material time. But I started having poor appraisal in 2019 when I protested non-payment of 90 percent of my salary for a period I worked for, but the second Defendant decided to disregard for reasons known to him,” she claimed.
She also claimed that between the period of September 17, 2019 and October 10, 2019, she had reasons to reject the discriminatory payment planned by Oloyede.
During this period, the claimant claimed that she acted as a whistleblower of unethical conducts by the second defendant. This she said, continued to work against her with the connivance of some people at the Management level.
She also claimed that her medical report were released to the HMO, who was mandated to cross check the medical report she obtained from LASUTH.
Ojelabi, the publisher of Freelanews, is an award winning and professionally trained mass communicator and a recipient of the D9112 Superstar Icon Award, who writes ruthlessly about pop culture, religion, politics and entertainment.
