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BNW |
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B N W: Biafra Nigeria World News |
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Presidential pardon for Biafran soldiers yet to be gazetted:� Two years afterayodele adegbuyi, abujaABOUT two years after President Olusegun Obasanjo granted pardon to the Biafran soldiers, the said pardon may yet be a mere statement with no effect as it has not been gazetted as required by law, the Secretary General, Retired Army, Navy and Air Force Union (RANAU) Colonel Bola Ogunsanwo, has said. Ogunsanwo, who stated this on Tuesday at a forum by the House of Representatives Committee on Defence to interact with stakeholders on military pension, said with no Federal Gazette, the affected officers remained dismissed in the army. According to Ogunsanwo, the implication of not gazetting the pardon was that the affect officers may not be able to venture into politics or hold public office. He, therefore, appealed to the relevant authorities or agencies of the Federal Government responsible for this lapses to immediately publish the pardon in the official Federal Government gazette. Also N20 billion is required to offset the backlog of arrears of pension and gratuity of 97,000 retired ex-service men nation-wide, the chairman of the Directorate of Military Pension, (DMP), Group Captain Adamu Kashiro, has said. Kashiro, who dropped the hint, gave the breakdown as N15.4 billion for seven months pension arrears while the remaining N3.6 billion is for gratuity and death benefits. The DMP chairman said all the arrears are expected to be settled before or by end of this year, adding, from next month, the payment of pension to ex-service men would be regular. On the controversies surrounding the non-payment of pension and gratuity to some categories of ex-military men disengaged on medical ground as well as those who served 10 years and were retired, he said that nothing concrete was being done about their case. According to him, the over 13,000 men in this category were recalled for re-assessment in error as they have been without pension for 20 years. He, however, promised to send a comprehensive list of those affected officers and men to the House Committee on defence who may in turn meet with defence authorities on what to do about their plights. The representatives of RANAU and the Legion urged the House Committee to treat the issue of pension arrears of the ex-service men such as like the emergency case in Plateau State. General Adedayo (retd), who represented the RANAU president, noted that an average military pensioner has lost hope in the system due to unfulfilled promises of the past. However, the president of Nigerian Legion, Group- Captain C.I.C. Nnabuiyan (retd), called on the National Assembly to create an emergency fund to settle the arrears of pension being owed the ex-servicemen. In what look like a twist in the matter of the controversies surrounding the non-payment of gratuity and pension to the medically unfit discharged soldiers, a finance institution, the Day Spring Ventures on Tuesday said members in the category owed it N54 million. The General Manager of the company, Prince Adedamola Gbadebo, who appeared before the House Committee on Defence, explained that most of the discharge soldiers used their discharged certificates to borrow money from the company. According to him, the understanding was that once they were paid their cheques would by discounted at five per cent.
Wednesday, June 30, 2004 |
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