By Kolawole Ojebisi
The Governor of Imo state, Hope Uzodinma, has said his administration is ready to name and shame those swindling millions of naira out of the state government in the name of receiving pension.
The message was targeted at those the governor said have been earning more than N330 million annually as pension.
While speaking at a meeting with the leadership of the Nigerian Union of Pensioners (NUP) in Owerri, the state capital, he said some pensioners were receiving huge sum of money above their retirement salaries while others get outrageous amount that are unaccounted for.
The governor said he had set up the process of integrating Imo pensioners into the National Contributory Pensions Scheme.
“I’ll soon publish names of those who earn above N330m per annum as pension for Imo people to know,” he said.
“Government will no more make use of microfinance banks for payments of salaries and pensions because they are no clearing houses for BVN holders so that pensioners can be paid directly.
“Government has decided to automate all payments to enable it to migrate to the contributory pension’s scheme.”
With this in place, he said nobody would be able to defraud the government any longer after the biometric verification.
Uzodimma said that only primary and secondary school teachers, who have been verified and confirmed to be employees of government, will receive their salaries.
He advised those “playing politics” with pensions and salaries to desist from doing so as his administration is set to going after such people.
Recall that In May, the governor had scrapped payment of pensions to former governors, deputy governors, speakers and deputy speakers of the state; a decision that won him plaudits from the masses, party’s affiliations regardless.
Meanwhile, in June huge stream of pensioners flooded the streets of Imo state, steadily for days, protesting against backlog of unpaid pensions by the state government.
Governor Uzodinma, however, considered the series of protests to have been sponsored by some people he said “are playing politics” with pensions and salaries.
