N78bn severance benefits: Hope rises for ex-airways workers
The pathetic plight of over a thousand workers of liquidated Nigeria Airways may come to an end soon as there are indications that the Federal Government has concluded plans to pay them N78billion of their severance benefits.
Woleshadare.net learnt that the fund is domiciled with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) in the past two years with stakeholders wondering what is holding on to the disbursement to the retirees, some of whom have passed on while others are down with health challenges.
Consequently, the National Union of Air Transport Employees (NUATE) is set to petition the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) over the plight of the former workers of the national carrier.
President of the union, Mr. Muhammed Safianu, in an interview with our correspondent in Lagos, said that the union would, in the next few days, officially write NLC to intervene in the matter and ensure that the final several packages of N78 billion was paid to the workers.
He noted that an inter-ministerial committee set up by the government to come out with the actual amount of money to be paid the workers, had come up with the N78 billion to over 6,000 staff of the liquidated carrier.
The committee, he added, also recommended 1 per cent administrative charges, totalling N735 million to any government agency that would disburse the funds to the ex-workers.
He, however, regretted that a department under the Ministry of Finance, Presidential Initiative on Continuous Audit (PICA), which the present administration set up to review all government payments, showed interest in the disbursement of the funds.
According to him, PICA, in its recommendation to the government, reduced the sum to N43 billion, but increased the administrative charges to N2.1 billion without any recourse to percentage as recommended by the inter-ministerial committee.
He said: “The final severance packages to the former workers was N78 billion and the inter-ministerial committee set up for that purpose recommended 1 per cent administrative charges to any government agency that will carry out the disbursement. “But, all of a sudden, PICA showed interest in the payment and reduced the sum to N43 billion. It, however, increased its administrative charge to N2.1 billion.
What we want to do right now is to involve NLC. We want them to intervene in the whole matter so that people can get what they rightly deserved. In a matter of days, we will send our documents on the issue to NLC so that people can get what they rightly deserve.”
However, a source close to the Ministry of Transport has claimed that the power tussle between the Minister of State for Aviation, Sen. Hadi Sirika and the Chairman of PICA, Mr. Mohammed Kyari Dikwah, may be responsible for the delay in payment of the final severance packages to the former national carrier workers.
According to the source, Sirika, in a meeting with the former workers of the defunct national carrier earlier in the year, had promised that the beneficiaries would get their severance packages by last March, but regretted that the misunderstanding between the duo, is causing untold hardship on the workers who had lost at least 700 of their members since 2003 when the carrier was liquidated by former President Olusegun Obasanjo.
The source alleged that the non-payment is stalling the commencement of a new national carrier for the country as promised by the government in 2015.
The source said: “When two elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers. The power play between Sirika and Dikwah is what is causing delay for the payment of the ex-workers.
The money has been with CBN in the past two years, not that the government will still raise it as a bond, but the Dikwah has promised to ensure that the money would not be paid. It is an ego thing. “The man is frustrating the efforts of Sirika and the non-payment of the severance packages is affecting the commencement of the national carrier.”
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