...Oni vindicated
While the Ekiti State governor, Dr John Kayode Fayemi, has repeatedly denied owing pensions and gratuities due to retirees in Ekiti State, the national leadership of the Nigeria Union of Pensioners (NUP) has revealed that the governor owes the pensioners to the tune of N38 billion.
According to a press statement by the spokesman of a pro-Segun Oni group, the Ekiti Build Back Better (EBBB), Idowu Adelusi, made available to journalists in Ado-Ekiti on Thursday, the group referred to the press conference addressed by the union in Akure, Ondo State capital, recently as an eye opener and "one that bursted the lies of the governor."
The union had disclosed that the Ekiti government was owing the retirees N38 billion.
EBBB, thus, wondered why Fayemi, who had been owing the state's workers "seven months unpaid salaries, four years unpaid leave and Christmas bonuses, N38 billion unpaid pensions and gratuities and who promoted workers without financial backing since 2018 when he assumed office, could rush for a presidential nomination form of N100 million."
Adelusi asked, "which is more important? Is it the workers' welfare or a personal ambition? The chunk of the provision of pensions and workers' salary in the 2022 Budget of Ekiti State has been diverted to fund the 'master's' presidential ambition and the 'son's' governorship ambition which is why it has been pretty difficult for the government to pay workers' salary."
The group's spokesman decried the denial of workers the reward for their labour, asking "why should any government want to refuse the retirees their gratuities and monthly pensions, having expended the productive period of their lives to serve the state? Why should these aged people be made to suffer as if we will not one day become retirees?"
Adelusi quoted the Public Relations Officer of the NUP in the South-West, Comrade Olusegun Abatan, as saying, "you can imagine if this type of governor becomes the presdent of the Federal Republic of Nigeria; what will happen to pensioners? Won't they die in penury?"
Adelusi said the coming of former governor and the Social Democratic Party (SDP) governorship candidate, Asiwaju Segun Oni, was to put an end to "the machinations of the two smart 'Ifas' who have cornered the commonwealth of Ekiti people and appropriated it for themselves, their families and political associates."
He said the Oni-led administration was not part of the those that owed the pensioners N38 billion, explaining that when Oni came on board in 2007, he paid all the arrears of gratuity and pensions right from the time of the old Ondo State which he meet on ground "and continued the payment of pensions, gratuities, workers' salaries and other entitlements regularly till he left the government in 2010."
He added that "during Oni's administration, the retirees were paid on 20th; teachers on 21st; local government staff on 22nd; civil servants on 23rd, and political appointees on 24th of every month.
"Oni set the target that all retiring civil servants should be paid their gratuity within 60 days of retirement.
"He did not see regular payment of workers' salaries as an achievement, but a normal and necessary thing to do, as he believed every worker is entitled to his or her salary at the end of every month.
"This is unlike what obtains under Fayemi where workers have to embark on fasting and prayer for payment that is done at first or second week of the new month.
"The former governor never sacked any worker, but instead recruited 4,000 fresh ones cutting across all strata, unlike the Fayemi and Fayose administrations which saw the sacking of workers employed by each other as if competing for medals.
"Let the BAO Campaign Organisation and the APC continue to dish out lies, thinking that Ekiti people are fools and would be taken in by their lies; we shall always burst it with truth, because truth is constant and Ekiti people have queued behind Segun Oni who they know as Omoluabi who has never deceived them."
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