By Olukayode Michael, Maiduguri
The Borno State Nigeria Labour Congress have asked
Governor Alhaji Kashim Shettima, to pay up the outstanding N20 billion being owed
pensioners before handing over power to his successor on May 29, this year.
Speaking to journalists on Wednesday in Maiduguri, the Borno State NLC Chairman
Comrade Titus Abana, lamented that both pensioners at the state and local
governments in the state are still owed N20 billion in gratuities and pensions.
Abana decried that the last time gratuity of retirees was paid in the state,
was in 2013, lamenting that all efforts to impress it on the state government
to pay workers and pensioners their entitlements on time were
turncated and frustrated by some top government officials.
He said: “In spite of the release of a tranche of the Paris Club Refund, the
state government has not paid the backlog of gratuity and pension being owed
retirees.”
He has the governor to keep by his words, stressing that: “We met with the
governor to push for these payments, he promised to do so before he leaves.
“He said he will not want his predecessor to inherit any burden from his
government and promised he will pay all arrears of pension, gratuities
accumulated by his government and the past government.”
The labour leader said: “We are reminding him to also pay the backlog of
promotion arrears and leave grant of workers which has been pending for more
than three years due to the biometric verification.”
He lamented that: “No worker has been paid any benefit in the last three years
since the verification started..”
He said that the exercise has exposed many workers to untold frustration and
hardship.
He decried that: “Many retirees have died untimely deaths due to frustration
and hardship.”
Abana further appealed to the governor to allocate the state government’s 1,000
Legacy Housing Estate to the civil servant with a view to cushion
accommodation problems of the state workforce and safe workers from the threats
of landlords.
He said the workers are looking up to better times with the newly elected
governor.
He said: “Workers expectations from the new administration of Professor
Babagana Umara Zulum is very high, we hope that the new government will carry
the civil servants along on board in all its plans and policies in
order to succeed.”