The Kwara State government on Sunday clarified that it does not owe pensions, stressing that it is up to date with payment of salaries and entitlements to State workers and retirees. This clarification follows a media report which suggested that some pensioners in the State had died since April, 2015 as a result of unpaid pension allowances.
In a statement on Sunday, the government emphasized that local councils are responsible for the payment of allowances to the LG retirees referred to in the media report.
“Local government councils in the state, which receive separate allocations from the federal government, are responsible for the said pensioners and have varying degrees of staff and pension arrears,” the statement reads.
The statement noted that the councils have been unable to pay their workers and retirees regularly for the past few months due to the sustained drop in federal allocations accruing to them.
According to the statement, the nonpayment of salaries and pension is not peculiar to Local Government Councils in Kwara State as most LGs are facing similar challenges which are reflective of the current financial situation affecting the country.
The Statement, however, noted that the State governor, Abdulfatah Ahmed is working with LG chairmen to resolve the salary and pension crisis at the LG level, including the recent release of N162m to augment allocation for the payment of July salaries, adding that the government was considering other strategies to assist them within its available resources.
The government therefore, called on pensioners and labour unions as well as the opposition to stop trying to blackmail the state government using the plight of the local government pensioners as this is misleading and diversionary.
