Enugu's Hotel of Death

Workers of Hotel Presidential, Enugu, owed several months of salaries and other entitlements, continue to die out of frustration, hunger and starvation.


‘There is no doubt that the Hotel Presidential, Enugu has run out of business and competition in the hospitality industry for a very long time’

The above is an outcry by the impoverished workforce of the hitherto thriving Hotel Presidential, Enugu to Governor Sullivan Iheanacho Chime. The workers, operating on the platform of ‘All Staff of Hotel Presidential, Enugu’, in a letter to the Governor, dated March 21, 2010, disclosed that they are, at the moment, owed over twelve months salary arrears by Godwin Nomeh management of the hotel. (Picture left shows a Hotel Presidential suite; Right is Governor Sullivan Chime of Enugu State)

Signatories to the workers’ petition entitled: ‘Save Our Souls’, include Enebechi Jonas, Augustine Obiekwe and Richard Eze. The trio, understandably, signed for and on behalf of other workers of the hotel outfit.

The petition which the suffering workers, equally, addressed to the Speaker of the State House of Assembly, Barrister Eugene Odo and Chairman of the hotel’s Board of Directors, Sam Onyisi, complains that the management of the hotel has, in the past four years, refused to pay them promotions, leave allowances and service charge, as contained in the company’s conditions of service.

Worst of the situation, according to the working people, is that the hotel management has willfully refused to implement the new salary structure introduced by Chime’s government at his assumption of office way back in 2007. What this means is that while other civil and public servants in the state have been enjoying the minimum wage of N7,000.00 since the Chime era, their Hotel Presidential counterparts go home virtually empty-handed at the end of the month, a situation considered to be sub-human and anti-workers.

‘The core reason for writing this letter titled, ‘Save Our Souls’ is to implore you, Your Excellency, to use your good offices and pressurize the authorities concerned to release and ensure that our arrears of salaries are paid without further delay’, the hungry workers enjoined Governor Chime.

It seems that the greatest casualty being suffered by the workers include intimidation and harassment by the management. Most pathetic of all, many of them have been disengaged without the due process of law because such workers dared demand for their wages. The implication of the foregoing is that, as far as the Hotel’s Board of Directors, led by Sam Onyisi, and the management, headed by Nomeh, is concerned, the universally acclaimed dictum that laborers deserve their wages should go to ‘hell and burn to ashes’.

‘We seize this opportunity to inform you that majority of our staff in the hotel have been retired or forced out of office unjustly for daring to ask for our salaries and allowances. To this effect, so many workers have been forced out of the establishment unjustly without paying them their entitlements’, the aggrieved workers lamented in their petition.

But many indigenes and visitors to Enugu are not new to the pathetic story of Hotel Presidential, Enugu which was established by the Eastern Nigerian government of Dr. Michael Iheonukara Okpara in the 1960s alongside that of Port-Harcourt, Rivers state. But while the Presidential Hotel, Port-Harcourt makes ‘big’ business and thrives for the comfort of both the staff and people of the state, the proceeds from the-day-to-day running of Hotel Presidential, Enugu continue to swell the personal pockets of few of its management staff.

Part of the information at the disposal of the magazine is that the Hotel recently generated N3.5million from a function held in one of its halls, but this ‘clique’ of managers that runs the outfit sat down in a room and shared out the money to themselves.

And this was in spite of the fact that workers of Hotel have been owed twelve months salary allowances and other entitlements. Is it not intriguing that, despite the efforts of Chime government to pay up salaries of workers of Enugu state before the 25th of every month, workers of Hotel Presidential, Enugu languish in abject poverty and frustration? It is believed that some of the workers have, following the inhuman treatment and degradations, borne out sheer refusal of the hotel’s authorities to pay them their entitlements, died. And the number of these casualties continues to swell by the day.

The remaining workers of the hitherto burbling hotel outfit brimmed with hope when, sometime last year, Chime government appointed the Onyisi Board of Directors to look into its management, but it is yet to be seen what inputs the new management has made to revive the moribund edifice.

The level to which Hotel Presidential, Enugu had, over the years, degenerated is not only embarrassing but tear-evoking. The edifice which, also, used to be a major center of attraction east of the Niger and beyond, is now basically a home for rodents and reptiles, as well as a laughing stock.

Rather than making efforts to make the hotel more profit-oriented so as to pay the workers their entitlements, the management of the hotel appears to be in a fix on how best to run the edifice. While most rooms of the five storey hotel no longer have electricity, the few lighted rooms are, often times, given out to political appointees as guest rooms, a situation which was so common during the past administration in the state. And over the years, there have been serial looting of the hotel’s furniture and other important items under the very eyes of the hotel’s management.

Funny enough, the very few patrons who pay to use any of any of the halls or restaurants of the hotel are, in addition to such payments, always asked to pay for the gas or diesel being used in the hotel’s generating sets. Even at that, some of the functions get interrupted half-way following the dilapidated nature of the generating sets.

Information at the disposal of this magazine shows the disgusting use which the Hotel Presidential, Enugu has been turned into in the recent times. One of such uses is known as ‘short time’ business. This is said to involve some fraudulent staff of the hotel charging non-lodgers certain amounts of money for a short stay inside the hotel rooms with their sex mates. And this practice is said to have become more rampant than it was in the past.

As it were, the workforce of the Hotel seems hopeless over their pitiable situation. Even the appointment of Onyisi-led Board of Directors does not seem to hold any special promises for the staff, as there are no visible signs of things turning around for the better, at least, in few months ahead.

Another nagging problem still being suffered by the Hotel Presidential, Enugu is encroachment into its expansive premises. Over the years, some outfits listed as Niger Foundation Hospital, Rock Family Church and some car servicing and repair firms have dangerously encroached on the premises of the Hotel. Although the state government has made one or two attempts aimed at recovering the lost plots of land, not much seems to have been achieved in this direction.

However, efforts by Insider Weekly Magazine to get the Hotel management to react to the issues making the rounds concerning the Hotel were fruitless. A proposed interview with Godwin Nomeh, General Manager, did not, eventually, hold, as the GM was, on Friday July 9 while Insider Correspondent waited in his office reception, holed up in his office for a certain seeming endless meeting. The magazine remains in possession of more revelations concerning the can of worms in Hotel Presidential, Enugu, and this will be given future treatment.

Oh, can GOD (through Governor Chime) come down to Enugu State to touch the stony hearts of Hotel Presidential management to address the plights of the working people?