Ogun state: “Pay our gratuities, and harmonise our pensions” pensioners tell Dapo Abiodun.

The Ogun State chapter of the Local Government Pensioners Association of Nigeria has requested that the state’s governor, Dapo Abiodun, pay their unpaid gratuities and standardize their monthly pension.

At the association’s thanksgiving celebration conducted at the LOGPAN state secretariat in Abeokuta, the state’s LOGPAN chairman, Benedict Ademoye, called for the payment of the accrued gratuity, which totals sixty-eight billion naira.

He bemoaned the governor just paying N3 billion of it.

Speaking about the N80 billion that the governor spent to settle pensioners’ claims, he claimed that the amount paid was different from the gratuity that pensioners were asking for.

He said, “pension is constitutional, it is mandatory, pension is in the law. So any government that comes has to pay pension, and the figure the governor gave you is correct, yes, it’s just like when we are at work, and we are taking our salary.

“That one is constitutional, it is mandatory for the government to pay that one, but that’s aside from gratuity which has accumulated to N68 billion and the government has paid just about three billion out of it.

“The delegation of four, led by late chief Sikiru Ayilara, who is the association’s former chairman, met the governor on the 16th of August 2022, and of course, the governor acceded to our request. the governor promised that he will increase it as revenue increases.”

“Late Chief Ayilara asked for two billion naira every month, and this has to be merged with the revenue and capability, of course, to pay.

“But after that meeting, the quarterly release was increased to 600 million naira, 300 million naira for the state pensioner and another 300 million naira for the local government pensioners.

“We cannot be satisfied because N68 billion to N3 billion is not enough. We are placing our hope on his promise.”

He noted that, among other things, the administration has not yet addressed the increase in the quarterly fund release amount for the payment of gratuity arrears and the harmonization of monthly pensions.

He said, “after the meeting with the government by late Ayilara, the governor acceded to all the request of LOGPAN and promised to take necessary action in respect of; increase in the amount of quarterly release of fund for the payment of arrears of gratuity, and harmonization of monthly pensions among others, but they have not.”

He pushed the state administration to keep going, saying that he appreciated all of their efforts, but acknowledged that they were making progress toward their goal.

He said, “considerable progress have been achieved. We shall not relent on our efforts until total victory is achieved. That is, settlement of all outstanding arrears of gratuities and harmonisation of monthly pensions. A new lease of life shall come upon the life of each and every LG pensioner in Ogun State.”

In the same vein, he was grateful to the governor and encouraged him to make the state’s retirees happy while in office.

He claims that the association has received supportive feedback in the hopes that “pensioners would laugh at the end.”

He said, “I respectfully call on His Excellency, Dr. Prince Dapo Abiodun MFR, the governor of Ogun State to please not relent in his current effort in seeing that pensioners in Ogun State in general and LG pensioners, in particular, have cause to rejoice during his time by seeing that the outstanding gratuities are paid and monthly pensions harmonized. I wish him, his family and Ogun State well.

“I’m hopeful that Pensioners would laugh and this gratuity would be paid.

“Unfortunately, we lost our leader, and this new executive came on board, on November 10th, which is about two and half months ago.

“Since that two and half months, we are not sitting idly, we have been Consulting with top government functionalities and government agencies that are relevant to our course.

“And until this moment, we’ve been getting positive responses. We know this time is a political something, but then we will not lose focus.”