Federal Government yesterday accused the Staff Union of the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN) of fraudulent activities by not remitting workers' pension contributions since 2006 in line with the new Pension Act.

Consequently, the government has set up a panel, headed by a former Auditor-General of the Federation, to investigate the alleged violation of the Pension Act.

These were revealed yesterday by the Minister of Power, Prof. Barth Nnaji, while briefing State House correspondents, after presenting the Ministry's 2012 Budget performance to President Goodluck Jonathan.

He put the budget performance at 52.9 per cent. Speaking earlier, the Presidential Adviser on Media, Dr Reuben Abati, made clarification on what informed the briefing on budget, saying "it is not intended for witch hunting neither are we here to indict anyone.

It is to ensure transparency and accountability and beyond all of these, it is to ensure that Mr. President's intention is to ensure that proper standards are set and that going forward, priorities in term of service deliveries are properly defined".

On the allegation of fraud, Nnaji regretted that the PHCN Union officials have been going about blackmailing government while distorting facts, saying they were behaving like "outlaws".

Nnaji spoke further on this. "For labour, there is a lot distortions out there. It is unfortunate that they are not getting the proper information but I can promise you that this week, we are going to realise a lot of information pertaining to the main issue which the union was quarrelling with government about.

"That has to do with how much they are going to take. They say it is N85,000. I cannot understand how they could say that. Many of the people who are junior officers, some of them with WAEC qualification are going to go home with N8 million.

"We just do not want to publish the tally sheet. Somebody who is in the position of an Assistant General Manager could go home with N28 million. The highest officer could go home with N38 million. So, anybody who is telling you N85,000 has a different mission.

"The area of difference is the following, the Union wants to be paid 25% of the benefit at point of severance. That was an old policy before the 2004 Pension Reform Act. After the Act, they continued to carry on with the 25%. "They collected this money without remitting the money into the account, it was just written on paper. So, the workers had nothing in their account. That is something we have now set up a panel to investigate and we have set up a panel headed by a former Auditor-General of the Federation.

"It amounts to fraud to have that kind of thing going on. Secondly, the money that is being promised workers are retired based on that. What government has decided to do is that since no money was paid into the account from 2004 to June of this year, the government will pay what is in the law.

"Government will pay its own component that is the PHCN component of it. Workers were supposed to contribute 7.5% and PHCN pays 7.5% but since PHCN did not pay, government will pay it. This makes 15% . But the Union is saying that they would like government to pay the 25%.

"Every worker out there; be it private or public follows the Pension Act and how on earth would you say you do not want to obey the law of this nation. That is the threat. This is a country of rules but they go and attack an official of PHCN dragged her out and stripped her because the woman hold position of Acting General Manager, Human Resources.

Unions do not act this way. PHCN Unions are constituting themselves as outlaws. It is not right".

On the 2012 Budget performance, Nnaji said out of the N75.4 billion budgetted for capital projects, N21.5 billion has been released and only N11.4 billion has been utilised.

He also spoke about plan to prioritise the completion of the 156 on-going projects, increase generation as well as develop alternative sources for generating power.

On the supply of pre-paid metres, he said: "We have set a time of 18 months for Nigerian consumers to be metered".

greall1: pension they were not working for

gboss4sure: GEJ's Government has been exposing the rots and scams in the government even before he came to power, that's why every monki is shouting impeach GEJ, resign GEJ dis and dat.

justokey: The fate of NITEL staff will soon befall them. Who will employ a corrupt incompetent person. Even the new order will leave them behind. No wonder they want all that they can get NOW.

greall1: pension they are not working for

Dafe clement: let there be light in ninja for at least 24hrs before we can say hurray, any way good work mr minister keep it up

sharp man: This is strange!!!

Is it the workers union that deducts and remits pension contribution or the employer?

My understanding is that the employer does the deductions since the salary is paid by them and then remits to the pension fund administrator. so how come the workers union is involved in this case?

edicolove:

Have you being living in a cave? We have already achieved one week uninterrupted and you are still talking of 24hrs. Please lets all support the power reforms. It must work, no going back. It is only witches and wizards that don't like light.

slickfiz: To my amazement,we've had light for 2days straight but now I see the reason why. There's fire on the mountain so they are up on their toes. However, it is stupid of them to bring bills only to go on strike the day after. Went to their office to pay this morning & that how I found out about this so called strike. Despite the pension fraud, PHCN staff on the other hand are fraudulent. They've been giving us imaginary bills and increasing them rapidly monthly only for the to bring a bill of N68000 to our home 2months back so we made a report to their manager and after investigation, the truth was discovered.
Privatisation is the way 4ward. Make a change if U want things to change.

ayobase:

Read what u wrote again....thats so moronic of u!

ayobase:

Dont be daft....from the workers' salaries, 25% is being deducted monthly for the purpose of pension....research before u post rubbish my friend!