We won’t support further verification exercise —NUP

Dr Abel Afolayan

THE Nigerian Union of Pensioners (NUP) has warned that it would not support any further verification exercise, saying that it would not allow its members to go through what it described as endless verification exercise.
To this end, the union has called on the Federal Government to ensure that the ongoing verification exercise by the Pension Transition (PTAD) will be the last.
The pensioners lamented the endless agonies their members have to undergo every now and then to partake in the verification exercise.

Speaking during the inauguration of the new executives for NUP, Federal civil service sector, the deputy General Secretary of the union Chief Adeniyi Okunade, who represented the President, Dr. Abel Afolayan, said the pensioners want to see that verification are concluded in good time so that those who have not been paid for many years are paid.

While commending the efforts of President Muhammadu Buhari to address the plights of the pensioners, he regretted that many attempts to meet the President to place their problems before him have not been successful.
He stated that some individuals have been preventing them from seeing President Buhari to tell him about the challenges pensioners in the country are facing.

He said, “we have some challenges, but we are not resting on our oars. We are fighting hard to make sure that our rights are given to us, to make sure that all arrears are paid, like the 33 per cent arrears. We want to see that verifications are concluded in good time, so that those who have not been paid for many years can be paid, and that they will not take their entitlement in the grave

“We have written to President Buhari. As soon as he was elected, we wrote to him that we wanted to hold a meeting with him, but some people have been blocking our way. We have not been able to see him. But we have used the media to draw his attention and to let the world know our plight. Thank God, he had set up a committee now to solve the problems of pensioners.
“The PTAD Executive Secretary is the secretary of that committee. He wants them to let him know all the problems of pensioners – all the outstanding arrears and how much it is. He has asked them to give him a total package. We trust that he will do something about it.”

On the continues verification exercise, Okunade said the pensioners have received assurances that this will be the last as the PTAD has said it is working on a data bank for pensioners
He said, “I think they are assuring us that this is going to be the last one.. And we want to thank them that this ongoing verification is the best so far. They have made a very good arrangement. We thank PTAD and the government. We hope that it will be the last. They said they will get a data base where everybody who gets into the data base will be permanently recorded and will continue to earn his pension until he dies.”
On his part, the Chairman of the NUP Federal Civil Service, Comrade Sunday Omezi said many of the pensioners have died while waiting for their pension.
He decribe their situation as dire, saying only a quick conclusion to the verification might bring respite to the pensioners; some of whom he said have been removed from the payroll since 2010.
He said, “What I want the Federal Government to do is to pay us our arrears. We have some members, since 2010, their names were removed from the payroll.. So, what we want government to do now is to look into their case and pay them. most of us are dying on daily basis. And those people that have died cannot collect anything.. That is why we are appealing to the government to hasten the verification exercise they are doing so that they can pay us.”