The Nigeria Union of Pensioners (NUP), Rivers State Chapter, has urged the state Government to improve on the handling of gratuity and pension arrears payments.
The Chairman of NUP in Rivers State, Collins Nwankwo, in a press briefing on Monday in Port Harcourt called on the government to prioritize paying full benefits to retirees with smaller entitlements, allowing them to make effective use of the funds.
Mr Nwankwo said “the State Governor approved additional one billion naira to what we had for the payment, so now, we can talk about two billion naira monthly payment for gratuities, initial pension arrears and death benefits to our pensioners.
“We are happy about that, It will boost expectation. Before now, we have been talking about the need for this and even more, because the magnitude of indebtedness on the part of Government relative to the pensioners in the state is very high.
The money released does not really make the kind of impact that is expected because so many people out there are still not paid.
“But is a good beginning. We have to commend the Governor. The mode of payment is different thing from availability of funds .That is the area we are also preparing to meet officials of Government.
“We are aware that some of our members are not paid fully what they are supposed to be paid. Some are given half, some a bit.
“But the whole essence of that is because the fund is insufficient. And with this, given the number of people and amount of debt being owed, I doubt if they may change that very pattern drastically, they may not.
“We are advocating that let them pay them up particularly those whose benefits are not very high.”
Those within ten, nine, eight, seven million naira and so on should be paid up given this kind of amount of money.
It will be more impressive, if they line up people they are owing, pay them up let them go home.
“We are going to get back to them, to see how we can restructure the committee for payment, so that the committee will also involve members of the union, so we see how best to go about it” .
In his contribution, the Secretary of NUP in Rivers State, Joseph Agbo, stated that the current administration has only increased the payment from N1 billion naira to N2 billion naira.
He argued that the amount is still insufficient to clear the backlog of gratuities and pension arrears.
Mr Agbo commended the Governor for bringing out one billion every month to add to what has being collected by ministry of finance to pay the existing pensioners who has not been paid their initial pension arrears .
He explained that the amount released monthly, two billion naira is not sufficient .
According Mr Agbo, Rivers state is judge on three items, initial pension payment, gratuities and death benefit.
He said “these three components at the time we did tripartite committee meeting, the figure given by the Government was one hundred and ten billion naira.
“The former Government released one billion and present Government released one billion naira, it cannot be enough to pay the money owned pensioners by Rivers State Government .
“The point is that the money itself has lost its value .The Government has not done harmonization. What I was paid in 1999 is what i am still receiving now, the money is nothing. The Government should harmonize pensioners payment.
“We appreciate the Governor for the increase but we want the state Government to treat the problem of pensioners seriously. The pensioners of this state are suffering”. He also disclosed that pensioners in the state should be given Christmas bonus just like the civil servants who were paid one hundred thousand naira Christmas bonus by the State Government.
