Osun pensioners protest over unpaid entitlement

Pensioners under the Forum of 2011/12 Retired Public Servants of Osun staged a protest against the non-payment of their entitlement at the entrance to the Government Secretariat.

The chairman of the group, Mr Omoniyi Ilesanmi, who addressed newsmen on the sidelines of the protest, said they are out to ensure the government does not divert the released Paris Refund for other use.

It would be recalled that the Osun state government through a statement yesterday, July 18, 2017, confirmed payment of second tranche of Paris Refund to the state and promised judicious distribution of the fund.

ALSO READ: Osun state confirms receipt of N6.314B as second tranche

Meanwhile the chairman representing the Triangular Group of Pensioners in the state, Prince Rotimi Adelugba has raised alarm over the splinter motive of the Ilesanmi-led group.

In a statement, Adelugba accused the group of being sponsored by the opposition in the state to paint the present administration in a bad light; a situation he said is capable of breaching public peace.

His statement read, "Right before the state government announced precisely how much it received from the federal government as second tranche of the Paris Refund; we were intimated on the series of meeting held by Ilesanmi's group and other operatives of the opposition.

"As much as we support the right of our colleagues to express their constitutional guaranteed right of freedom of speech and expression, we take an exception to their collaboration with politicians in the state thereby giving their protest a political undertone.

"We are calling on the security agencies in the state to be on the lookout for well-armed miscreant who have been embedded with Ilesanmi's group with the aim of destabilizing the peace we enjoy in the state of Osun."

On the payment of pensions and gratuity, Adelugba pleaded with his colleagues to come to the negotiating table like over 30,000 members of the Nigerian Union of Pensioners have done rather than going on the streets with the sole aim of embarrassing the government and not engaging it.

"If resolution of the issue at hand is their intention, they will be on the negotiating table and not the streets, but we are certain their intention is otherwise. The government have been open to us. I recall, Osun was the first state to publish how it spent the first tranche of the Paris refund.

"We have confidence in Governor Aregbesola's administration to properly disburse the second tranche of the refund like it did the first one," the statement read.