Intels CSR targets host communities self-employment needs

Events in the past few weeks have once again exposed the frosty relationship between Niger Delta communities and the oil majors. Difficulties in the relationship between host communities and oil companies have over the years impacted negatively on the nation’s economic growth and stability.
Since youths began to arracks oil facilities, the region has been in the news for the wrong reasons. While the indigenes endure filth and environmental degradation, due to the operations of oil firms, the companies and their sponsors daub their separate habitations with lucre.

 Over time, grunts gave way to grudges, murmurings to complaints, anger to violence, and today, neither the hosts nor their guests are at ease anymore. Agitations for compensation and rehabilitation had only yielded lucre to a few vocal or exposed community heads at the expense of others. Soon the bubbles burst, as everyone wanted to be counted.
Having also tried this approach early in its over 15-year community interventions, Intels Nigeria Limited opted instead for a robust community relations model called the Integrated Participatory Approach (IPA).
This Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) approach, according to the Head of Community Relations, Mr. David Alagoa, integrates the host communities, government and clients into the company’s policy thrust to create an “Us” instead of “Them” as commonly practiced and which distances the communities from the guest-firms.
Consequently, projects and programmes follow, sometimes after “heated quarrels, but always as agreed to be the most pressing need of the communities, and as could be afforded by the company. With 28 communities being serviced and Onne as the core target, “overtime, this model translated into jobs, empowerment and projects,” Alagoa said.
He noted that while “project” is the easiest, fundamental and most easily seen, “employment” is built on the company’s “Onion Ring Policy.” Onne, as the immediate host community, is the core target, then the catchment areas, council, state and so on.
The policy has five concentric circles, with Rivers housing the first three - community, catchment area and state, while other South-South states are in fourth position and the rest of the country in fifth. For Intels, Onne and Ogu are the jewels in the crown and have actually received the most attention.
Intels’ Head of Administration, Mr. Chibuisi Onyebueke disclosed that while Onne has a 10km concrete road, lined on either side by a drainage channel (10km each) and built to last over 100 years by Intels’ subsidiary, Ogu chose interlocking stones because the area is waterlogged. It has so far got 6.7km of community roads cumulatively.
He disclosed that Intels has a yearly CSR budget of over N3 billion, spent on scholarships to its host communities, free primary healthcare programmes, empowerment through trainings and vocational skills, direct provision of social amenities and infrastructure, and special interventions, like the N3 billion on the East-West Road.
These projects, executed to world class standards, included the 10-kilometre concrete Mount Zion Road at Onne, with the accompanying dual drainage channels, solar street light at Onne, and the Onne Ultra-Modern Market, complete with 65 lock-up shops and enclosed large, open trading area, water treatment plant, conveniences and security post.
The 6.7km network of internal roads in Ogu, the King’s Palace and Civic Centre, which now stands as a symbol of unity for its two earlier warring communities, the Ogu Ultra-Modern Market with 50 lock-up shops and enclosed open, spacious trading area, as well as youth secretariat built and equipped.
Road networks at Rumuokwurusi and Ogbunabali communities, the Amadi-Ama neighbourhood water project,Olobulo Ultra-Modern Market, Information Communication Technology (ICT) centres at Rumuokwurusi and Ikot Ansa, completed six-classroom block and an ongoing construction of another six-classroom block in Old Netim, renovation of 10-classroom block in Rumuokwurusi and an ongoing renovation of school block in Rumuokwurusi.
Completed renovation of Onne Girls Secondary School and restoration of a number of schools in the town, renovation of Amadi-Ama Community School, renovation and equipment of Eleme Craft Centre, and restoration of its civic centre.
The Ekurede Itsekiri Town Hall perimeter fencing, restoration of Ikot-Ansa Town Hall, restoration of Orugbo Jetty, ongoing construction of Ekpan Health Centre, provision of electricity transformers for many communities, including Rumuokwurusi, and a 100-KVA generator in Ikot-Ansa, among others.
“In employment, we offer the community the chances first, and where we do not get the required professionals, we look outside,” Alagoa said.
This has so far reflected in its employment ratio, where Rivers contributed 6,290 (43.2 per cent) of its Niger Delta employment volume of 10,104 (69.5 per cent) of the company’s total workforce of 14,574 employees, leaving other states with 4,470 (30.5 per cent).
Through its Host Community Graduate Trainee Scheme, 50 graduates exclusively from the host communities and exclusive of the physically-challenged are employed yearly.
“Empowerment is based on the reality that not everyone can be directly employed, therefore Intels undertakes formal academic and skills training in recognised secondary schools, higher institutions and other relevant establishments. This includes scholarships, where secondary school students get N50,000 and undergraduates N200,000 per year,” he said.
The sponsorship increases per person with time, just as the number varies from community to community, again with Onne as the highest.This exercise has already gulped N45 million this year, having hit about N161.7 million as at 2013 from a “modest” N1.57 million in 2001 when it started.
To avoid discrepancies and conflicts, scholarship applicants are pre-tested and dully identified by the community, while the company is under no obligation to employ them afterwards, except if there is vacancy in their fields.
The skills empowerment programmes include pipe welding, pipe fitting, argon welding, structural welding, industrial electrical training, entrepreneurial training, and the STCW 95/marine training (International Convention on Standards of Training, Certification and Watch-keeping for seafarers).
Others are mud engineering, catering craft, hairdressing and cosmetology, Microsoft Office and Sun Java, AutoCAD training, computer engineering, crane and forklift training, and warehouse and material management course.
The Women Empowerment Project Scheme (WEPS), located within the Onne Port Complex, represents one of the company’s most audacious CSR programmes, where women, many of whom are illiterates, are not only upgraded but also taught (and some retained) to make high-quality coveralls used in the oil and gas and other industries.
The facility has two lines of production of 150 each, and over 200 specialised machines, 160 of which are single-needle machines.
According to the WEPS Head of Administration, Mrs. Dorcas Ekong, the training includes cutting, joining, furnishing, folding and packaging.
“The scheme trains the intake to become a total woman and not just give them production training or jobs. We introduce every intake to learning on improved interpersonal skills, to become more effective.