About 500 ex-Nigeria Airways staff are to be verified in another round of verification exercise currently going on simultaneously at Lagos and Kano centres. The national vice chairman of the ex-workers union of the Airways, (north), Mr Mohammed Adamu who disclosed this said that most of the eligible workers had been audited and paid 50 per cent of their severance package after the earlier exercise conducted in the six geo-political zones in September 2018.
The Presidential Initiative on Continuous Audit, PICA, this week commenced a week-long mop-up verification for the ex-workers of Nigeria Airways who were not audited during the previous exercise.
The exercise is meant to ensure that all eligible beneficiaries were audited and paid their entitlements Speaking yesterday while inspecting the Lagos centre, the permanent secretary in charge of special duties in the ministry of finance, budget and national planning,
Mr. Mohammed Dikwa, who was represented by the deputy director of procurement, Mr. Izerebu John, told the ex-workers that the federal government would pay them their entitlements after the audit. He, however, advised the ex-workers to “cooperate with the verification officials by providing all the required documents”.
It would be recalled that Nigeria Airways was liquidated in 2004 without the almost 6,000 workers being paid any entitlements.
However, following continued agitation by the workers, President Muhammadu Buhari in 2018 approved 50 per cent severance package for all the audited staff of the airline and about 22.3 billion Naira was approved for the payment.
After much delay after the approval, the money was finally released last September 2018.
Reacting to this latest exercise, the Secretary-General, Nigeria Airways Pensioners Union, Mr Segun Adeleke expressed appreciation to the federal government for taking “this new bold and commendable step”.