United Bank of Africa Plc accounted for about 2,399 of the 8,584 employees sacked in the banking sector, comprising commercial banks, merchant banks and non-interest banks, Blueprint has gathered.
It would be recalled that in 2020 during the height of the lockdown, banking sector employees raised an alarm on the plan of the massive sack by their employers.
The concern caught the attention of the Central bank of Nigeria, with assurances that there will be no sack except it is absolutely necessary. But it seems it made little or no impact.
However, a check into the 2020 financials of Access Bank, United Bank for Africa, Guaranty Trust Bank, First Bank, Union Bank, and First City Monument Bank and analysis showed the cut-down in full-time staff.
Guaranty Trust Bank disengaged 412 workers as its staff strength fell from 5,606 in 2019 to 5,194 last year.
First bank also sent home 674 of its employees as its staff numbers dropped from 9,016 in 2019 to 8,342 last year.
Just as First City Monument Bank reduced its staff strength from 3,893 to 3,619 after disengaging 283 employees in 2020.
Access bank staff strength dropped from 6,898 in 2019 to 6,781 in 2020, while Union Bank dropped from 2,362 to 2,342.
Similarly, according to data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), the banking sector reduced its total headcount by 8.2 percent to 95,026 last year from 103,610 as of December 2019.
Breakdown of the data showed 63.5 percent of the retrenched staff where on contract as headcount dropped to 39,798 from 45,350 the previous year indicating 12.2 percent or 5,454 were asked to go home.
