ABUJA – Former staff of the defunct Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN ) on Thursday disrupted business activities at the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) for hours, demanding payment of their severance package.
The News Agency of Nigeria(NAN) reports that the protesters, who besieged the agency as early as 9 a.m., chanted solidarity songs and displayed posters with various inscriptions calling for the payment of their allowances.
Led by the President of the National Union of Electricity Employees (NUEE), Mr Mansur Musa, they claimed that they had not been paid any money since they left service in 2013.
Musa said that the protest was to demand full payment of their entitlements.
He said the Federal Government had not settled their terminal benefits which included severance payment, retirement gratuity, death benefits, and pension deduction, among other entitlements.
He said since the privitisation of the company two years ago, they had not been paid their severance package.
According to him, the BPE had carried out verification of the members severally, yet payment had not been effected.
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“Since most of the workers were disengaged following the privitisation of the PHCN in 2013, the government has refused to pay us our gratuity and pensions which has run into billions of naira.
“Most of the former workers have died while waiting for their severance package to be paid to them.
” Those who are still alive are living in abject poverty since they have no other means of livelihood.”
Musa blamed high level of corruption in the sector as the reason Nigerians were yet to enjoy steady power supply.
He said it was true that they promised that after privitisation, power would be stable.
“But they took over when power generation was 3,800MW, now we are generating about 2000MW two years after.
“This is not what Nigerians are expecting. ”
Musa claimed that over 40 billion dollars had been sunk in the industry.
“Remember the Elumelu committee that investigated the 16-billion-dollar fraud in the power sector during the administration of President Olusegun Obasanjo.
“Nothing has come out of it and nobody is saying anything. So government must probe the power sector,”he said
Reacting to the demand of the workers, the Director-General of the BPE, Mr. Benjamin Dikki, said the agency was in the process of paying the several packages of the workers.
He said since the last verification was done in February and the names and severance packages of over 3,000 workers had been sent to the Accountant-General of the Federation (AGF).
He assured the protesters that the government was not unmindful of their plight, adding that the government was working on modalities for the payment.
He, however, blamed the lack of synergy with the union leaders as the reason for the delay in payment of their entitlements. (NAN)
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