Refinery engineers begin open-ended strike

AMMAN –– Engineers at the Jordan Petroleum Refinery Company (JPRC) on Sunday started an open-ended strike to demand higher salaries, with assurances that fuel distribution will not be affected. 

Mustafa Momani, spokesperson of the striking engineers, told The Jordan Times over the phone that the vast majority of the 180 engineers at the refinery participated in the work stoppage to force JPRC management to listen to what he described as “fair demands” that include a 25 per cent increase of basic salaries.

He added that several MPs and representatives of civil society organisations visited the striking employees in their tent outside the premises of the refinery in Zarqa, some 22km east of Amman, claiming that they expressed support for the demands of the engineers. 

According to Momani, the engineers want the pay raise in order to be equal to their peers in other mining firms such as the potash and the phosphate companies. 

The spokesperson said the strikers also have other administrative demands, foremost of which is not renewing the contracts of engineers who reached retirement age of 60 years and cost JPRC hundreds of thousands of dinars a year. 

The strikers are against the renewal of the contracts of six employees. 

In remarks to The Jordan Times on Saturday, JPRC CEO Abdul Karim Alaween described the planned strike as illegal, saying the engineers received “unprecedented” pay benefits on March 26.

Their salaries were raised by 15 per cent of the basic wages in addition to increasing the cost of living allowances from JD145 to JD175 a month, Alaween said.

He said an agreement on these benefits –– which included all JPRC workers –– was signed by management and the association representing refinery workers, and sponsored by the government and Parliament. 

Alaween added that the workers were also granted other benefits, such as raising the allowance for experience and university scholarships for employees, in addition to a 5 per cent increase in the annual raise. 

The refinery CEO accused the Jordan Engineers Association (JEA) of being part of the problem, by inciting engineers to go ahead with their strike. 

JEA President Abdullah Obeidat called on the JPRC management to meet the demands of the engineers, which he described as fair and just.