Pensioners protest exclusion from national confab

Nigeria Union of Pensioners has protested its exclusion from the list of delegates for the National Confab.
In a March 7 letter to the Secretary General of the Federation, Anyim Pius Anyim; the NUP National President, Dr. Abel
Afolayan, complained that the government sidelined the union for the Council of Retired Permanent
Secretaries in filling the six slots for retirees.
The union which boasted it had over 1 million pensioners said it should have been consulted as the only union registered and approved by
the Ministry of Labour and Productivity for Nigerian civil pensioners/retirees.
The letter read, “As the only union registered and approved by the Ministry of Labour and Productivity for Nigerian civil pensioners/retirees, it was expected that our union rather than the association of the retired Federal Permanent Secretaries should nominate delegates to the conference. But to our greatest dismay, we discovered that the union was sidelined by council of Retired Permanent Secretaries who have nominated the
six delegates to represent the entire retirees across the nation. “It is our conviction that our union should have been consulted over this matter because we are the major stakeholders representing the interest of the entire Civil Service retirees/pensioners.
“Ironically, other related retirees’ Associations such as the Military, the Police, State Security Service, were all given slots to represent the interests of their members with the exception of the Nigeria Union of Pensioners.”
The union lamented that its earlier effort to correct the oversight was rebuffed by the Permanent Secretary (Special Duties) of the office of the SGF.
The NUP urged the Anyim to rectify this “ugly situation”
as soon as possible as it had been referred to the Nigeria Labour Congress for quick intervention as well.
“We are therefore, strongly protesting the exclusion of our Union from the National conference, which if not quickly redressed, would
lead to mass protest by pensioners all over Nigeria.
“In as much as we don’t want to offend President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, who has been a good friend of the pensioners as manifested in
his prompt response to the cause of the pensioners by our threat to embark on mass protest, we passionately appeal to the President for his quick
intervention to save this situation from degenerating to unmanageable crisis”, Afolayan added.