BY BRIGHT JACOB
The Chairman of ex-Nigeria Airways workers Pressure Group, Edward Dassah, has told The Point that they are still agitating for the N33 billion severance package balance after the Federal Government had approved and paid N45 billion to the former workers.
According to Dassah who said the pressure group was like any other normal group, and comprised of people coming together to press for what they were looking for, what was proposed by the Ministry of Aviation to the President for ex-Nigeria Airways workers’ entitlement was N78 billion, and not the N45 billion they collected out of desperation.
The nation’s former national carrier, Nigeria Airways, was liquidated by the administration of former president Olusegun Obasanjo in 2004 after it (Airline) ceased operations in 2003. It was in 2017, however, that the Minister of Aviation, Hadi Sirika, announced to State House correspondents after the week’s Federal Executive Council meeting, that the government had approved the payment of N45 billion severance packages to the former staff of the defunct airline.
“Governments, in the past, decided just to liquidate Nigeria Airways without tending to the issue of the entitlements of the workers and they (workers) have been struggling to get paid.
“We came in and took it very seriously. I’m happy to announce that Mr. President has approved N45 billion which has been confirmed to be the entitlements of these workers, and the Ministry of Finance has been instructed to pay the money,” he added.
“That amount would eventually go on to be paid in two batches, 50% each, because the government complained about paucity of funds. We asked the Chairman of the Pressure Group to give a brief history about these payments and others before it, and the challenges his comrades faced while receiving them.
“Let me put it this way since you started with the history of the payments. You know, in any society, in any community, in government, there are always laws, and when the government decided to liquidate Nigeria Airways, there were laws already in place that you could disengage people and pay them off.”
Continuing, he said, “These laws are there in black and white, and the government never really respected or did according to the law that talks about the disengagement of public servants. However, this same government respected those laws in other countries.”
Dassah noted that the administration of former president Olusegun Obasanjo paid off former Nigeria Airways workers in Europe and America, but was not willing to do so for those who worked in Nigeria.
“Our counterparts in Europe and America were properly disengaged. Their severance package was paid, but in the case of Nigeria, it was done haphazardly; it has been in phases, and you can imagine the inconveniences that people have suffered. So, yes, there are laws in place to take care of these things, but such laws on the whole have not been well-respected. This current regime started the process, and we are still trusting God it will come to a conclusion,” he said.
Dassah gave credit to the Buhari regime, but also bemoaned the fact that each worker was not given a lump sum, instead payment was in phases, including the N45 billion which came in different tranches.
“They have started paying. It started about four years ago from where the previous government started. The liquidation started in 2004, but the process leading to the payment has been in phases, and when you delay somebody’s money, it’s not a good thing. If you are giving a patient treatment, it should be wholesome. If you do it in piecemeal, it can endanger the patient. That has been our case,” he explained.
Responding to reports that the N45 billion approved and paid to the ex-workers was the amount confirmed by government to be their entitlement, Dassah said, “Because we were in a pitiable state, because we were desperate, we decided to collect the N45 billion that was approved by the government, but what was written to the president as per the request from the ministry that is in charge of overseeing the liquidation of Nigeria Airways, which is the Ministry of Aviation, to settle the issue was N78 billion.”
Giving further insight, he said, “So, when that letter got to the president from the minister of aviation, he minuted it down the line. But down the line, it was reduced from that N78 billion to N45 billion, and it was done without any justifiable reason. It was an arbitrary thing.”
“Jonathan refused to continue to pay. He directed us to go and meet the liquidator. I do not know where the liquidator would get money to pay us when all of Nigeria Airways property were sold as scrap, and bought by government officials, and yet they told us to go and meet the liquidator”
Dassah fingered Mohammed Dikwa, a former permanent secretary (Special duties), Federal Ministry of Finance, Budget and National Planning, who also headed the Presidential Initiative for Continuous Audit, for the reduction, and said he didn’t know why Dikwa did that.
“The person that did that is one Mohammed Dikwa, who is the erstwhile Chairman of PICA. Why he reduced that money is known to him. But what the Ministry of Aviation requested for was N78 billion. So, if you don’t settle that N78 billion, it means that one way or the other, the people you are owing will still continue to raise the issue up. Now, we are agitating for the balance of the N33 billion which the Ministry of Aviation requested for, and these are some of the things which we at the pressure group keep doing” he added.
Dassah observed that while they were not out to take the place of the National Union of Pensioners, their activities would however help to keep the Union awake, and people would see reason as they (pressure group) kept working. He said the work of the pressure group was tailored to also help the Union which is the statutory body that “normally does this kind of things”.
According to him, “We put the Union on the front burner so that they will not go to sleep. That’s the idea about the pressure group, and we thank God that they (Union) are doing their own best, and we hope to be doing ours so that there will be a kind of check and balance, so that at the end of the day, everybody will be happy.”
Dassah also responded to the allegation that there were ex-workers who haven’t received the final 50% of the N45 billion that was paid. He said, “There are still some pockets of people, very few (who haven’t received). There are some people who didn’t come for their verification in good time, and all that. It’s a work in progress. But, substantially, most people have been paid.”
Asked whether there were any challenges to collecting the balance of N33 billion, he said everything was a challenge in Nigeria. According to him, “There must be a challenge. Even if they approve money for you now, collecting it can be a challenge. There are bottlenecks which we call “the Nigerian System”.
For instance, if the president puts a red biro on paper saying “approved”, you have to carry it down to the Ministry of Finance, you go down to the National Assembly, you go down to the Budget Office, you go down to this place and that. It’s the normal bureaucratic process.”
On whether the government had given any assurance about paying the N33 billion balances, Dassah said there need not be, but that there had been a lot of background consultation and underground discussions going on.
“All hands are actually on deck to ensure that the balance of that N33 billion is paid. The Union is really trying, but the truth is that there are some things done in the background,” he concluded.
The Point also reached out to the Chairman of the Nigerian Union of Pensioners, Nigeria Airways Branch, Sam Nzene.
We asked why the government paid N45 billion instead of the N78 billion requested by the Ministry of Aviation. He also said he didn’t know.
According to Nzene, “I do not know why they did that. We do not know. Our payment is still going on. I don’t want to say things because we are still pursuing the matter.”
Nzene, however, remarked that the administration of late Umaru Musa Yar’Adua was one of those who were most receptive to matters relating to their payment.
He said Yar’Adua would have concluded all the payment if he hadn’t died, and that Jonathan did not help their cause.
“Yar’Adua was good. He paid us our money. If not for death, he would have concluded it. When he paid to a point, he became sick and passed on,” Nzene said.
Speaking further, he said, “Jonathan refused to continue to pay. He directed us to go and meet the liquidator. I do not know where the liquidator would get money to pay us when all of Nigeria Airways property was sold as scrap, and bought by government officials, and yet they told us to go and meet the liquidator.”
Nzene narrated that in one of the meetings called by the liquidator, he told the government that there was no way the liquidator could handle the payment, and the government eventually agreed with him.
According to Nzene, that was the period Yar’Adua’s government agreed to foot the payment (of their pension’s arrears).
He said Jonathan, on the other hand, during his tenure, had “bad advisers” who made him unwilling to continue with the payment and that even when they approached former Finance Minister, now Director General of the World Trade Organisation, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, she insisted that we went to the liquidator for payment.
Nzene also added that those who were short paid in the recent payments had been paid.
“About short payments, they were asked to fill a form, and those things were verified. Those who were short paid were paid. Their payments were adjusted,” he said.
