By Princess Simon (Bureau Chief North Central, Minna)
The National Union of Pensioners (NUP) Niger state chapter has made a passionate appeal to the Governor Abubakar Sani Bello led administration to look into the plight of retirees and ensure settlement of all their gratuities before handing over power next year.
The State Secretary of the union, Comrade Abdullahi Baba Sani, in an interview, said it is time for the Governor Sani Bello led administration to settle all outstanding gratuities for retirees, especially now that the administration has few months to it's exit.
Comrade Baba Sani expressed regrets over what he termed insensitivity of the state government concerning the welfare of retirees in the past few years. He said, ‘retirees are dying and some have been evicted from their rented apartments due to inability to settle rent arrears’.
Payment of gratuities in percentage is also unacceptable. According to Comrade Baba Sani, pensioners should be paid their 100% entitlements whenever funds are available to the Pensions Board, instead of this 30 percent thing”.
He also suggested that local government council audit department should be directed to do same. This, according to the union Secretary, will go a long way in reducing wastage so that the names of pensioners who have died but still appears on the payroll, can be removed.
Comrade Sani however regretted that the N40 billion gratuities and other pension liabilities were marred by irregularities, including infiltration of ghost pensioners, thereby robbing genuine retired civil servants of their benefits running into several millions of naira.
The NUP wants Governor Bello to ensure that all arrears and gratuities incurred by his administration are cleared to enable the incoming administration execute electioneering campaign promises and not being burdened with settlement of outstanding gratuities to retirees.
He said, “Mr. Governor came up with a 16-members committee which came up with recommendations which included that the state government should set aside 20 percent gross monthly Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) to cater for payment of gratuities and all pension related matters which could be reviewed upward or downward”.
Unfortunately, some individuals he refused to mention their names vehemently refused to allow for the implementation of the specific recommendations hence the present predicament the NUP found itself by having accumulated gratuities within the range of 30-40 billion naira unpaid to state retirees.
Comrade Baba Sani however pleaded with the state and local government retirees to be patient and show high level of understanding as the leadership of the union in the state is doing everything humanly and legally possible to see that all their entitlements are fully paid. NNL.