Governors okay plan to borrow 17tn from pension fund

• Pensioners kick

State governors have endorsed the proposal to borrow the sum of N17tn from the pension fund for infrastructural development.

A communiqué of the 22nd teleconference meeting of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum signed by its Chairman and Ekiti State Governor, Kayode Fayemi, confirming this approval was made available to journalists in Abuja on Friday December 4, 2020.

But the Nigeria Union of Pensioners (NUP) has opposed the decision, saying that the government has no authority over their money and should not tamper with it.

The NUP Head of Information, Mr Bunmi Ogunkolade, said most governors were not even remitting their workers’ pensions to the pensioner’s fund.

He noted that the governor’s forum was not recognised by the law and so, there would be no one to be held responsible if they failed to pay back.

He said, “We earlier issued a statement warning the Federal Government not to tamper with the pension fund when they mooted that idea. It is the workers’ money; people that would become pensioners tomorrow.

“Nobody should tamper with that money; they should look elsewhere for loans to build infrastructure. By the time the people in service would retire in four, five years, the current government would not be there and you won’t know who to hold responsible. The government should not touch that money and the governors have no right to give the approval to borrow from the fund.”