‘MOL, with the tacit approval of the Government, is violating contractual obligations’

The Union of Workers of INA and INA’s companies believes that the project of INA’s Management, which franchises gas stations to private entrepreneurs, is a marketing trick aimed at cheaply disposing of a third of its employees and closing more than a hundred stations, said Maja Rilović, president of the union, at today’s press conference.

The union will oppose this as such activities aim to reduce INA to a subsidiary of MOL and disenfranchise workers, said the union leader, announcing a protest rally in front of the Government headquarters on July 18.

The slogan of the protest and other union activities that will follow will be ‘INA works, MOL builds.’

INA has decided to implement a pilot project at a certain number of its gas stations, retaining ownership of all its retail assets, including concessions, property, facilities, infrastructure, goods, and products, while the entrepreneur manages these resources and receives a premium for the achieved turnover. Currently, a competition is underway for managers who can apply to manage up to three INA gas stations under the INA brand. The competition ends on July 20.

The union warns that the implementation of this project for all employees involved means an immediate termination of the employment contract with INA, resulting in the loss of all acquired rights, and opens the door for further reductions and layoffs by new employers who take over the gas stations on a franchise basis.

Maja Rilović states that INA actually wants to lay off 2,700 retail workers, which is a third of the total employees at INA, and to get rid of less profitable gas stations. She warns that the same management team that is conducting the action in Croatia has done something similar at Slovnaft in Slovakia and MOL’s network in Hungary.

– After leasing the gas stations, they set such contract conditions that there was no choice but to lay off a large number of workers, while the others had their salaries halved and acquired rights revoked, says Rilović.

She notes that according to the Strategic Partnership Agreement with the state, MOL must ensure a uniform supply throughout the territory of Croatia through INA, regardless of how profitable each station is.

Therefore, she calls on the Government, as one of the stakeholders, to resist MOL’s plans to separate a large part of retail from INA, as otherwise, she said, INA could be reduced to a MOL subsidiary for selling chewing gum, and INA’s workers to rental windshield washers.

MOL, with the tacit approval of the Government, is constantly violating contractual obligations with the Government, and besides retail, it is gradually shutting down INA’s research work as well as refinery processing, says the union representative.