By Bimbo Ogunnaike
The Acting Chairman of the National Salaries, Incomes and Wages Commission (NSIWC), Ekpo Nta, has promised pensioners that their earnings will also be increased after the Federal Government reached an agreement with organised labour on the new minimum wage.
Nta made the promise when the National President of the Nigeria Union of Pensioners, Abel Afolayan, visited him alongside the union’s leadership in Abuja.
Earlier, Afolayan had told Nta the vast majority of the pensioners rely on the token they receive for survival, pointing out that tension has died down with the agreement reached between the FG and organised labour over percentage consequential adjustments increase.
Afolayan added that but with the pensioners, the tension is high, and if they do not have anything tangible to present to their members at their meeting scheduled for next week in Ibadan, Oyo State, there will be problems.
“We still have people earning N2,000, some earning N10,000. Vast majority of pensioners in this country earn below N10,000. It is people in this category that are agitating. We want to know when our own work will start on your table,” he said.
Nta told the pensioners their allowance was not ignored during the minimum wage negotiation.
“This is the time we should have a major reform in our pension administration concerning the pensioners. There must be total U-turn of pension management in the country. It is a huge repository of funds and you must be abreast of what is happening. Certain per cent were deducted from the pensioners’ salary when they were working and they must know how this fund is being spent.
“You should not be asking for peanuts because if you don’t do it now, the problem that will come will be worse than the past. I agreed entirely with you; what I am saying is that it would be done,”Nta said.
“We must have a policy from the local government to the FG level on how to take care of our senior citizens. Everybody was aware during negotiation on the minimum wage and its consequential adjustment that there must be corresponding increase for pensioners and we shouldn’t wait for agitation again before we do that.”
“If for workers it is N30,000, then you must also define what minimum earning pensioners should get. I know that government is already working on it. It is being addressed because all along the negotiations, it has always been in consideration, and it was asked at the Federal Executive Council meeting; so everybody is aware that it must be done,” he added.
