- Call for fulfilment of N25,000 palliative promised them
The Federal Parastatals and Private Sector Pensioners Association of Nigeria (FEPPPAN) has urged President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to show compassion for retirees by ordering the committee negotiating the new minimum wage to recommend a living pension for them as well.
FEPPPAN made the call in a communique issued after its National Executive Council (NEC) meeting held in Abuja on Monday. The document was jointly signed by its Acting President-General, Alhaji Babaji Magaji and General Secretary, Franklin Erinle.
The union claimed that by giving pensioners decent pay, employers would be deterred from engaging in unethical behaviour aimed at gaining enormous money at the expense of the country’s advancement and growth.
Further bemoaning the substandard living conditions of Nigerian retirees, FEPPPAN added that many Nigerian workers today go to great lengths to support and promote corruption in order to have enough money for rainy days because they are afraid of retiring and finding themselves in the same situation as seniors.
The communique read: “When workers know they have a living pension, they would be less scared of what they will live on in retirement.”
“The citizens are the most important thing in everything about the existence of a nation. Therefore, it is only natural that improving the living conditions of the people you govern should be at the top of the government’s to-do list.
“Therefore, we are calling on the President to renew the hope of workers in trusting that they will not be worse off when they retire by giving Nigerian pensioners of today a living pension. Everyone working today will retire someday and for that reason, we equally call on the National Assembly and every worker in Nigeria to help us beg the president to give us a living pension.”
The pensioners also implored the President to show his sympathy for pensioners by disbursing the N25,000 palliative payment he pledged to them the previous year in response to the hardship brought on by the elimination of fuel subsidy.