Pensioners cry out, say ‘we’re suffering’

The leadership of the Nigerian Union of Pensoners (NUP) rose from a zonal meeting in Abeoukuta, the Ogun State capital with an appeal to the federal and state governments to pay their monthly pensionson regular basis.

National President of the NUP, Dr. Abel Afolayan, who addressed journalists, frowned at what he described as national negligence of the retirees, some of whom he said had died while struggling for their rights.

His words: “It is a sad commentary in Nigeria that the aged, who had worked for Nigeria are being neglected by the federal and state governments. I must tell you that we are not happy with this development which has led to the death of many of our members.”

He expressed disgust at the exclusion of the NUP from the list of delegates to the national conference, adding that as critical stakeholders in Nigeria, they would protest the development.

“We are going to embark on protest nationwide following our exclusion from the delegates’ list. None of our members is in the list and we are bitter about the ugly development. We are going to give government sleepless night. Ironically, present and previous governments have not been fair to us. They are insensitive to our plight. I can tell you, government is presently owing us pension arrears running to trillions of naira.,” he said.

According to him, Nigerian leaders only see pensioners as relevant before and during elections and once they are in power, they neglect pensioners.

“These our country’s leaders are wicked, they only come to us during elections, and after regaining power, they dump us. Can you imagine, a serving governor asking what else do we want, we are supposed to have died. How on earth can somebody be so wicked to have uttered such, and wishing us death? We shall not die before our time.

“When they need us for election, they come to us, when we need our money, they run away from us. These people are inhuman. Since 2000, many pensioners are dead, many are still suffering. Nobody seems to care if they are going to pay us the backlog. We want you, the media, to help us cry out. There is no home that has no pensioner, so we are all affected,” Afolayan said.