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Defunct PHCN retirees cry over unpaid benefits
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Defunct Power Holding Company of Nigeria, PHCN, pensioners, under the aegis of Concerned Pensioners, CPP, have appealed to the Federal Government to intervene over shortfalls in payment of their pension benefits by the Nigeria Electricity Liability Management Limited, NELMCO.
The CPP alleged unethical practice by NELMCO in shortchanging the retirees in payment of pension benefits.
CPP Secretary, Mr Julius Ayodeji, said some of the pension benefits, harmonisation, monitisation and electricity rebates, were trapped in NELMCO.
Ayodeji said NELMCO officially transferred pension payment obligations to Pension Transitional Arrangement Directorate, PTAD, in July 2014, however, the Budget Office remitted arrears to NELMCO instead of PITAD, thereby causing administrative conflicts.
Unrelenting as the efforts of the labour court were within the 2020 timeline, it was also afforded the opportunity to deal decisively with what appears to be a disturbing trend in the pharmaceutical industry. This relates to a requirement that employees complete an exit clearance or ‘successful disengagement’ process, as condition precedent to the release of their original educational certificates; collected by the employer at the start of employment. These employment disputes involving three pharmaceutical companies, across two divisions of the NICN, returned with similar holdings of unfair labour practice. The fact patterns are strikingly similar to many which are known anecdotally throughout the world of work.