By OLA AJAYI
NATIONAL Union of Pensioners, NUP, in Southwest, has said the recovery of N159billion meant for pensioners does not mean anything to pensioners until the money is paid to the already traumatized pensioners.

Secretary of the South west of NUP, Mr. Olusegun Abatan, said the alleged theft of such a huge sum of money that was meant for aged and fragile pensioners was the height of wickedness and a very disturbing report.

Speaking in Ibadan, he wondered how an ordinary person saddled with the responsibility of taking care of hapless pensioners could mismanage the money without anybody raising alarm.

Describing the news as heart-breaking, he noted that the money recovered by the task force was not enough to pay those who had been waiting endlessly for their gratuities and pensions alone.

He pleaded with the relevant authorities to put all machinery in motion to address some discrepancies in the running of the pension scheme.

The NUP zonal scribe said, “It is really a criminal act because these are people that ought to take care of pensioners but instead they are taking care of themselves”.

Making reference to the people involved in the pension scam, he said, “when you see them the director of pension at the office of the Head of Service and the Deputy Director, there was no way one could deduce that they could perpetrate such inhuman act.

According to him, “I think the problem we are having here is a problem of Nigeria because it is a wrong system we are running in the pension scheme. How could somebody steal such a big amount of money without detection? What we are talking about now is over N150 billion.”

“One thing I want to state today about this pension scam is that the tax force is not saving anything. In fact, the N159 billion or so that the tax force said it has saved government, if you calculate the money of those that have not been placed pension, those who were placed on pension but are not paid regularly; those that were paid irregularly and we have some people earning as low as N10,000. If you calculate all these, it would amount to more than the money the tax force claimed they have saved the government.”

“What we are saying in essence is that pensioners are owed several months of pensions, some are owed gratuity, government should not keep this money and claim that they are saving it for us. They are not recovering anything; they should pay pensioners this money because it is their money that some people have siphoned.”