DIMENSIONS OF EMPLOYMENT DISCRIMINATION IN THE ORGANISED PRIVATE SECTOR OF OYO STATE, NIGERIA

Abstract

Employment Discrimination (ED), bias towards or against workers, is a common phenomenon in organisations. Evidence has shown that the Organised Private Sector (OPS) is bedevilled with ED in Oyo State which hinders institutionalisation of decent work. Previous studies focused more on prevalence, predicting factors and social actors’ reactions of ED than on its dimensions. This study, therefore, was carried out to investigate the dimensions of ED in the OPS of Oyo State, Nigeria. The Disparate Treatment and Impact Theory served as the anchor, while the study adopted the survey design. Three sectors (agriculture, manufacturing and services) of the OPS in Oyo State were enumerated, using disproportionate sampling technique. Five unionised and accessible and one accessible but non-unionised organisation were selected: three from manufacturing, one from agriculture and two from services. A total of 340 employees were randomly selected across the six organisations with 24 trade union officials and 48 Labour Inspectors (LIs). The instruments used were Employees ED (r=0.89) having eight subscales, Trade Union ED (r=0.93) having five sub-scales and Labour Official ED (r=0.77) having two sub-scales questionnaires. In-depth and key informant interviews were held with five labour leaders, two LI officials and three Labour Law Practitioners (LLPs), respectively. Quantitative data were subjected to simple percentage and mean, while qualitative data were thematically analysed. Majority (99.8%) were males and had master degree (99.9%), with the mean age 45.5±8 years. Age based discrimination (42.7%) is the most prevalent ED followed by gender (28.5%), religion (20.9%), while ethnicity is the least (12.6%). The EDs were not reported due to culture of silence (21.5%), fear of repercussions (4.5%), ignorance (20.6%) and seeking spiritual of supports (12.9%). Against the threshold of 2.5, ED engendered poor job performance ( x =2.99), job-related stress ( x =2.99) and absenteeism ( x =2.96), and had adverse effects on employees’ well-being ( x =2.96), job commitment ( x =2.91), organisational image ( x =2.68) and profit margin ( x =2.63). Trade unions, unlike the employees, were aware of provisions for redress, but were inattentive to EDs because allegations were not properly substantiated. The LLPs were of the view that existing labour statutes did not specifically address EDs due to non-availability of anti-discrimination policy. The Ministry hardly received ED reports; and there were no funding for prosecuting offenders. The dimensions of employment discrimination in the Organised Private Sector of Oyo State were along the lines of age, gender, religious and ethnic dimensions. These dimensions of employment discrimination should be mitigated by trade unions and officials of the Federal Ministry of Labour.