Ex-Nigeria Airways’ workers plead with Tinubu over N33bn entitlements

There is uneasy calm among former workers of the defunct Nigeria Airways following the delay in the payment of their outstanding pensions amounting to N33 billion, it was learned.

The former workers are increasingly restless and call on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to put a close to the issue of their unpaid pension and gratuity.

Nigeria Airways, the country’s former national carrier, was liquidated in 2005. Since then, the workers have been pursuing their entitlements.

Former President Muhammadu Buhari paid part of the entitlements after a series of protests and demonstrations by the workers who are now senior citizens.

Hundreds of them have passed away waiting for their entitlements even as they vowed that a new national carrier would not see the light of the day unless their severance package and other entitlements were cleared.

In an open letter to the president, the former workers urged Tinubu to “beam a bright searchlight on the current plights of the still surviving ex-workers and pensioners of the defunct Nigeria Airways” and kindly pay them their total legally allowed labour rights, and entitlements without further delay.

A former Secretary General of the National Union of Air Transport Employees (NUATE), Comrade Olayinka Abioye, reminded the president that “our colleagues, brothers and sisters formerly of the liquidated Nigeria Airways are still owed by the federal government the last tranche of their severance benefits.”