Ex-workers of the Nigerian Aviation Handling Company Plc (NAHCO) have alleged that the payment of their one-off severance package by the Pension Transitional Arrangement Directorate is fraught with irregularities.
This came about 15 years after the privatisation of NAHCO by the Bureau of Public Enterprises.
The ex-NAHCO workers under the aegis of the Former NAHCO Staff Forum lamented the long journey to getting their entitlements.
They claimed that scores of the former aviation workers had died without getting their entitlements.
The former staff members also claimed that only about 120 ex-workers were paid what they described as peanut out of about 750 former staff members expected to get the one-off severance package.
They alleged irregularities and corrupt activities in the payment of the severance package by the PTAD
The General Secretary of the forum, Alademomi Sanmi, spoke on behalf of the ex-workers.
He said, “Most of us were forced out of work in 2008. The privatisation began around 2005 to about 2007 when it was listed on the Nigerian Stock exchange.”
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Sanmi said the development made ex-NAHCO staff members under the aegis of the forum to write PTAD through the National Union of Air Transport Employees and the Air Transport Services Senior Staff Association of Nigeria.
He said, “They started paying batch one around June this year. We were promised completion of the payment by July. So, Batch One to Batch Four have been paid. The fourth batch was paid last week.”
Sanmi said it was after they disbursed the money for the fourth batch that he noted that there was no list of beneficiaries for the funds.
He said, “We are asking PTAD these questions: What modalities are being used for payment? How many people are the actual beneficiaries of this struggle?
What is accruable to each individual? What is the total amount for ex-NAHCO staff? I remember one publication that outlined the whole money amount to over N2bn.”
Sanmi expressed shock over the disbursement of paltry sums of between N29,000 and N32,000 as one-off severance packages to many of the ex-workers of NAHCO, wondering how PTAD arrived at such ‘ridiculous computation’ for people who spent between 15 and 20 years in service.
