Ondo’ll offset accumulated gratuities, pension from January – Akeredolu

Gov. Oluwarotimi Akeredolu on Tuesday promised to start clearing accumulated gratuities of retired workers and the arrears of pension, as from January.

Akeredolu stated this in Akure during the National Pensioner’s Day celebration.

Represented by Alaba Isijola, his Special Adviser on Labour Matters, the governor said necessary machineries were being put in place to ensure that pensioners in the state receive their pension and gratuities regularly.

Our correspondent reports that majority of retired workers since 2011 have yet to collect their gratuities, while local government pensioners are owed three months pension, and state pensioners owed one month pension.

Akeredolu said, ”We inherited seven months pension arrears from the previous administration, but as at today, we have cleared almost everything.

”On the gratuities, the government has mapped out strategies of paying affected pensioners as from January 2019. So, rest assured that we will not promise what we cannot do,” he said.

The governor said welfare of pensioners was paramount to his administration, hence the decision to approve three of the requests of the Nigeria Union of Pensioners (NUP) state chapter when its leadership visited him recently.

In his address, Chief Raphael Adetuwo, Chairman, NUP, Ondo State, called on President Muhammadu Buhari and state governors to implement a section of the 1999 constitution that compelled upward review of their pension to enable them cope with economic realities in the country.

Adetuwo said that continuous violation of Section 173 subsection 3 and 210 (3) of the Constitution by government had exposed many retirees to untold hardship as some collected ridiculous pension of two to five thousand naira monthly.

”It is inhumane that there are still some pensioners whose monthly pension is less than N5, 000 while many receive over N500, 000 monthly,” he said.

Adetuwo said that thirty per cent pension increase approved in 2014 has yet to be implemented by both the federal and state governments.

The chairman, who commended Akeredolu for paying their pension regularly since he assumed office, urged him to offset accumulated gratuities of many pensioners and harmonise discrepancies in monthly pension of retirees.

”Non-harmonisation of pension is another painful issue to pensioners. A grade one principal of school who retired in 1986 receives N40,000 per month while his counterpart who retired in 2013 receives N250,000 monthly.

”It is our belief that if there is a minimum wage, there must also be a minimum pension and people who are retired on the same post and the same grade level ought to be earning the same monthly pension, no matter the number of years separating their time or date of retirement,” he said.

Adetuwo joined the call for the creation of Ministry of Pension Affairs by the Federal Government to resolve various challenges of the senior citizens with more pragmatic approach nationwide.