Following the death of Chief Gideon Ezeji who once functioned as Chairman of Imo Union of Pensioners, Chief V.C Nwokeji who stepped in as Acting Chairman, to pilot the affairs of Nigerian Union of Pensioners, Imo state chapter, expressed regrets that their colleagues could die like fowls.
Last Wednesday, November, 15, 2017 when our reporter visited the NUP office at World Bank Housing Estate Owerri, Chief Nwokeji regretted the death of his former boss and stated that it came about, “as a result of the abandonment of pensioners by well known Imo leaders. In a grief stricken and visibly broken voice, Nwokeji lamented, “Imo leaders have abandoned us”. Those he referred to as Imo leaders, he reiterated, include the clerics, traditional and socio-cultural leaders and prominent politicians. “More worrisome, is Chief Engr. Emmanuel Iwuanyanwu, the Ahaejiagamba Ndigbo, who we all respect so much, had since abandoned us to our fate”, he lamented.
Speaking further, he observed that political gladiators and aspiring political office holders who wish to succeed the incumbent, hardly care or even consider their ugly and piteous plights in the hands of Owelle Rochas Okorocha.
He felt that it was improper for prominent leaders who should know better that payment of pension and gratuity are their inalienable and statutory rights, to ignore their predicament because of pecuniary interest. He narrated sorrowfully how his darling wife died as a result of the same hardship arising from non-payment of monthly pension. Pensioners he said are dying steadily and it behooves on our aspiring political leaders to force Okorocha to do the needful, adding that the wife who retired as a lecturer died without enjoying her pension.
He called on Imolites to educate Okorocha that monthly pension is not a privilege to retirees but a right that should not be denied them.
Meanwhile most Imolites have expressed shock over the sudden death of the former Chairman of the National Union of Pensioners and pleaded with Governor Okorocha to forget his ambition to be the president of Africa and face his job as Governor of Imo state and address the nagging problems of pensioners and the ridiculous free education where students of model secondary schools and those of urban development secondary school have no roof over them and sit neither on the bare floor or on windows to study. Such, observers said is very shameful and disgraceful for a Governor who claims to be concerned about the plight of the poor in the society.
