By Obike Ukoh
Payment of retirees entitlements-pensions and gratuities, have indeed become a national challenge. It is doubtful if there is any state in the country that is not battling with payment of pensions and gratuities.
Abia State Governor, Alex Otti is battling with the settlement of pensions and gratuities arrears owed workers. In fact, Otti made it a campaign promise to clear the arrears. He has fulfilled the promise, as the governor recently cleared the pension arrears to the tune of about N10billion.
For payment of gratuities arrears, it appears to be a herculean task as the ex-Gov. Orji Uzor Kalu’s administration that ended in May 2007, was the last administration to show interest in the payment of gratuities.
Ever since then, there was no coordination in the payment of gratuities to retirees.
Otti brought the issue in the state to national attention recently, when he signed a bill into law abrogating the “ The Abia State Governors and Deputy Governors Pensions Law No. 4 of 2001.’’
Otti who spoke after signing the bill into law, said it was part of efforts to promote good governance and stewardship in Abia State.
The governor said that he strongly believed that leadership was all about stewardship and should not be viewed as an opportunity to embezzle public funds.
He stressed that “government is not about self-interest, it is actually self- interest that destroys government.”
Otti said that prioritising public welfare over individual benefits ought to be given key consideration in policy-making.
Otti also said that pensioners needed the funds the most, and not former office holders.
“One of the people that should be paid wrote me about not being paid; I put a call across to him and explained why it should not be paid and he agreed with me.
“I told him we have not paid anyone and he said that he wants to confirm that he was not being singled out.
“The point I am trying to make is that even the people that should receive it believe that repealing the law is the best,” the governor stressed.
Otti’s abolition of the pension law attracted national applause with former President Olusegun Obasanjo leading the pack.
Obasanjo commended Otti and the Abia State House of Assembly for their courage to abolish the law which entitled former governors and their deputies to enjoy life pension.
The former president described the abolished pension law as “rascality.” He expressed the hope that other governors would follow Otti’s footsteps.
‘It is daylight robbery,’ Obasanjo declared, adding that:
“It’s like trouble because it allowed them to have a house in Abuja and elsewhere. And it allowed them to cart away whatever they could. Yet the pensions of ordinary people from 2014 were unpaid.
“What sort of leadership! You came and said there would be an end to that rascality. I congratulate you, and I say to you, I hope that your colleagues will follow in your footsteps?”
However, all the former political office holders that ought to be the beneficiaries of the pension law, have all come out openly to declared that they have not received a dime since they left office.
One of Orji Uzor Kalu’s aide said:
“As a former governor of the state, T. A. Orji did not pay him (Kalu) a dime as pension and Okezie Ikpeazu continued in the same manner.”
Similarly, Theodore Orji’s Liaison Officer, Ifeanyi Umere, said the ex-governor had not been receiving pension.
Similarly, ex-Gov. Okezie Ikpeazu expressed disgust over the law, describing it as “obviously sponsored,” and “mischievously couched to give the false impression that Dr Ikpeazu is among former governors of the state currently receiving pension from the Abia State Government”.
Also, Ikpeazu’s deputy, Ude Oko Chukwu, said, “Nobody has given me a dime. I am aware of the law.
“ For me, it (the law) is as good as not being there. If all past governors said they have not been paid anything, what is the essence of the existence of the law?”
As a reaction to Otti’s scrapping of the payment of pension to former governors and their deputies, Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) renewed its call for the removal of the pension law from Nigeria’s statute books.
It urged President Ahmed Tinubu to emulate Otti and obey court judgment stopping pensions to ex-governors.
SERAP recalled a judgment dated 26 November, 2019, delivered by Justice Oluremi Oguntoyinbo, following a suit it instituted.
In a letter to Tinubu, dated March 23, 2024, signed by SERAP Deputy Director, Kolawole Oluwadare, the organisation said: “We urge you to emulate the good example of Governor Otti by urgently obeying the judgment, something which former President Muhammadu Buhari blatantly failed to do.
“Unless the judgment is immediately obeyed, former governors and their deputies, including those now serving as ministers in your administration and members of the National Assembly who receive pensions would continue to evade justice for their actions.”
“SERAP agrees with former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s conclusion that states’ pension laws are ‘acts of daylight robbery’, and his call for such laws to be abolished by other state governors.
“ Obeying the judgment would show the sovereignty of the rule of law in Nigeria and go a long way in protecting the integrity of the country’s legal system.
“Obeying the judgment would also show you as a defender of the Nigerian Constitution of 1999 (as amended), the rule of law, and public interest within the government.
“Buhari turned a blind eye to the judgment. State governors have failed to provide names of former governors and their deputies who have collected and continue to collect pensions from their states and the amount so far spent on these ex-officials.
“Justice Oguntoyinbo in her judgment granted ‘an order of mandamus compelling and directing the Attorney General of the Federation to urgently identify former governors and their deputies collecting pensions from their states and to seek full recovery of public funds from those involved.’’
SERAP claimed that over N40 billion have been collected by former governors serving as ministers and members of the National Assembly.
In annulling the pension law for Abia State former governors and their deputies, Otti indeed was following the footsteps of Imo, Kwara and Zamfara state governments, among others.
When Gov. Hope Uzodinma, assented to the bill repealing the ` Imo State Governors and Speakers Pensions and Privileges Law of 2007,’ he explained that his government sponsored the bill because it was illegal and designed to allow few privileged people feed fat on the commonwealth of the people.
His then Commissioner for Information, Mr Declan Emelumba, said that the state has about 15 people that had served as governors, deputy governors and speakers, adding that N1.2billion would be saved from the stoppage.
On his part, when then Zamfara State Governor, Bello Matawalle, now Minister of State (Defence), annulled the state’s pension law, stressed that no ex-governor is poor, given the perks of office they enjoyed, in most cases for eight years.
Under the law, former governors are to receive N10 million monthly as pension for life, among others.
It is commendable, that Otti followed the progressive step by abrogating the pension law and also poised to end the pensions and gratuities brouhaha in the state, with the promise to introduce the Contributory Pension Scheme (CPS) in the state.
Otti, who announced government’s intention to introduce the CPS through
Okey Kanu, Commissioner for Information and Culture, said plans had been concluded to commence the
scheme for civil servants.
Kanu said the goal is to give pensioners a sense of belonging.
“The state government has concluded plans to introduce a contributory pension scheme for Abia civil servants.”
“The plans for establishing the scheme have gone very far and very soon we would start the cutover to a contributory pension scheme.
In fact, the CPS and the cutover, will be the permanent solution to Abia’s pensions and gratuities issues.
The CPS that came into force in 2004 at the federal level has to a large extend brought stability to the pension administration.
With the CPS, and fine-turning the grey areas associated with it at the federal level, the issue of delayed payment of entitlements to retirees in Abia would be a thing of the past.
