More than 20,000 retired primary school teachers in Akwa Ibom State are said to be groaning under excruciating pains and penury over non-payment of gratuity and arrears of pensions amounting to billions of naira owed them by the state government.
The retirees, who attended an emergency meeting on Tuesday, November 27 in Uyo left the service from 2010 to 2018, decrying their poor state of living and calling on the state government to pay backlog of gratuities and pension arrears owed them.
They vowed to lead a peaceful protest to the government house in Wellington Bassey Way, Uyo, if their concerns are not addressed immediately by the government.
Speaking with Straightnews reporter shortly after the meeting, Rev. Peters George, Chairman, Retired Primary School Teachers Forum, wondered why they were regarded as third class workers in the state as their counterparts at other levels of the public service have been paid their entitlements.
“From 2011 till date, retired primary school teachers have not been paid their gratuities whereas our counterparts in secondary school have been paid. The core civil servants have been paid their gratuities. We don’t even know whether we are third class workers in this state that we retired since 2010 and up till date, we have not been paid our gratuities. That is why we are annoyed.”
Giving a breakdown, the chairman explained “Though the state government paid gratuity for 2015, few of us are still remaining. For 2014, government owes us five months’ pension arrears; for 2015, we are being owed 10 months of pension arrears. In addition, we suffer from irregular payment of monthly pension up to three months before a month is paid.
“Again, the government has not refunded 7.5 per cent contributory pension deductions to retired primary school teachers. We are equally owed promotion arrears from 2012 till date.
“Government should pay us our gratuities and arrears of pension because some of us are dying, some are bedridden in the hospital, some of our children have been driven out of the post secondary and tertiary institutions. Our stories are very pathetic because government is insensitive to our plight,” he noted.
George faulted the state government’s claim that it has cleared entitlements it owed retired primary school teachers in the state, describing the claim as false and misleading.
The chairman further pleaded with the government to pay their entitlements as they do not have anywhere else to run to for help.
He said “we are still pleading as good citizens of this very state. We cannot take any actions because we do not have guns. We cannot take government to court either because it is our government. Let us be paid our gratuities and arrears of pension.”
Also speaking, Mr. Benson Benjamin, secretary of next of kin to the late retired primary school teachers from 1991 to 2018 in the state, said that State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB) had presented a list of names amounting to estimated N5.2 billion to government for payment.
Benjamin said the next of kins are more than 5,000, however, expressed regrets over government’s refusal to pay their entitlements despite their efforts to do so.
However, the argument on whose responsibility it is to pay gratuity and pensions to retired priamaty school teachers was rested by Michael Ogundare (JSC) in a Supreme Court’s ruling 2002, enshrined in section 7(2) of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended).
As a back-up to this constitutional provision, Akwa Ibom State House of Assembly in 2017 granted approval for Governor Udom Emmanuel administration to obtain a loan facility of N1.9 billion to pay counterpart fund to Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC).
Yet, SERAP, in a report published by Straightnews in April 2018, alerted that Akwa Ibom government wasnone of the states in the country yet to provide counterpart funding to Universal Basic Education Commission (UBEC) in order to access N1.7 billion matching grant from Univeral Basic Education (UBE).
