Anguish, pains of ex-Nigeria Airways workers

When crying endures for a night, joy comes in the morning, is a popular maxim usually quoted by religious leaders. This aptly describes the situation of hundreds of former workers of the Nigeria Airways, once the pride of the nation’s aviation. Many of the former workers, now slowed down by age and sicknesses, narrated their ordeal in the last couple of years, as they struggled with the strenuous screening process to be paid their severance entitlements and other benefits on the premises of Skypower Catering Services Limited, the only functional subsidiary of the liquidated airline. Some of them were brought on wheel chairs to the ongoing verification exercise. Families have been devastated and broken-hearted because of the lack of access to retirement benefits.

A retired DC10 pilot of the defunct airline was said to have died on account of inability to raise enough money to buy essential medications. It is indeed lamentable that upon liquidation of the airline in 2003, foreign staff domiciled in the United States and Europe were paid 22 years benefits in accordance with the International Labour Organisation (ILO) regulations while a handful of their counterparts in Nigeria were paid for only five years, with retirement benefits of Nigerian staff left unpaid till date. Today, those who had the misfortune of being former staff of the old Nigeria Airways are living in penury, after spending their productive years working for the airline.

Their dream of blissful years after retirement suddenly became a mirage. Many have died, while several others are livin ill-health with nobody to help, not even their country, which owned the organisation they worked for. The ongoing verification exercise is not only chaotic but cumbersome for many of the former workers.

The sight of many senior citizens who came in wheel chairs, crutches, and assisted by their sons, grandchildren was heart-wrenching. It further exposed how thousands of them, who worked for the country, were badly treated. For 15 years, they waited in vain for their severance payment. Many children of deceased former workers also came to claim what rightly belonged to their parents. Majority of the former workers came from different parts of the country. The situation led to a huge crowd despite efforts by unions and officials from the Ministry of Finance to bring orderliness to the entire exercise. One of the retirees fainted from exhaustion. Colleagues tried frantically to revive him. He was eventually revived but appeared very weak.

The occasion also provided an avenue for friends and colleagues, who had not seen each other for over 15 years to reminisce on their time together. The first woman to be employed by the airline, Madam Eunice Nwanosike, told Woleshadarenews that she joined Nigeria Airways in 1956 when it was British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC). The 89-year-old Nwanosike nostalgically told our correspondent that the only department in Nigeria Airways then was Operations Department, stressing that after her employment, Printing Press was created and she was deployed to head the department. Brandishing her employment letter and identification card, the once pretty and youthful octogenarian, who sat and held her walking stick by her side, said she enjoyed her time working for the airline. She retired in 1984. She said: “I joined Nigeria Airways on September 1, 1956. I was born in 1929. I retired in 1984. When the war started in 1967, I went back to Enugu.

Three years after the war, we were recalled to Nigeria Airways and I went back to the Printing Press.” For Nwanosike, the joy has come after a long night. She added; “I feel fulfilled. My son is a medical doctor and I have children who took care of me and they are still taking care of me. I feel very happy today. I thank God for sparing my life to collect my money. I would have died long time ago but God spared my life.” Nwanosike lambasted former President Olusegun Obasanjo for “wickedly” killing Nigeria Airways. She said: “God will judge Obasanjo and the people who masterminded the death of the carrier. “God is angry with Nigeria because of what our leaders did to this airline and country. You can imagine that this airline employed over 6,000 people and you can imagine someone who was not in his right senses waking up one day to kill an airline without provision for workers’ benefits. What we asked for was legitimate. We worked for this. We were humiliated and took over 15 years to give us what rightly belongs to us.” Nwanosike called on the Federal Government not to relent on the plan to set up a national carrier, saying she would be happy it succeeds. She added: “I will come there to bless that airline because it will give jobs to a livlot of our youths.” Nwanosike lauded President Muhammadu Buhari for doing what she said other governments failed to do to give them their entitlements long after they left services. Another woman, who simply gave her name as Mrs. Okorie, said: “We were pushed away in 1999.

That was the period the government of Obasanjo started liquidating the airline, starting with the close down of the airline’s offices in New York and London. The final liquidation was done in 2003.” One of the union members coordinating the verification exercise, Lookman Animashaun, an aircraft engineer and one of the affected staff, admitted that it was a herculean task because of the anxiety by many of the former workers to quickly get their money. Animashaun added that the workers, who had gone through all the stages of verification, would start getting their money from this week. He said: “The money should start hitting their accounts as early as this week. By next week, many of the people that have concluded the exercise will get alert from their banks.

That should be done this week or latest next week.” An aircraft maintenance engineer, Effang Offiong, said it was unfortunate that successive governments since 2007 had been apathetic to the cries of the former staff of the liquidated airline, who had been clamouring for the payment of their retirement benefits. He stated that whereas successive ministers of aviation between 2007 and 2015 were well acquainted with the plight of the former staff, who deployed their prime ages in serving the country diligently, no cogent and appreciable steps were taken to address the legitimate benefits for which government was duty bound to ensure full compliance as part of the process of liquidation. One of the retired pilots, Captain Sheriff Mohammed Badamasi, summarised the horrendous situation the retirees were subjected to, describing the arrangement as shoddy. He said: “People have been sleeping here for the past three days because some of them came from far places.

Elderly people are not well treated until we called their attention to the plight of these people.” President Buhari had in September 2018 approved the release of N22 billion to settle backlog of former Nigeria Airways workers. At liquidation 15 years ago, the total number of members of staff of the airline stood at 6,731, but the number had since plummeted to 5,886 due to frequent deaths recorded among the former staff of the airline.

Wole Shadare