Governor Bello Matawalle of Zamfara State on Saturday disclosed that workers and pensioners have started receiving their pension contribution refund, following an alleged misappropriation by the immediate past administration in the state.
The governor’s Special Adviser on Public Enlightenment, Media and Communications, Zailani Bappa, made the disclosure in a statement sent to DAILY NIGERIAN on Saturday.
The statement read: “Following Governor Bello Mohammad’s efforts at addressing the misappropriation of refunded pension funds by the immediate past administration, staff of the state Government have started receiving refund of their contributions.
“This week, a great number of staff members have reported receipt of refund ranging from 400,000 to 850,000 of their earlier contributions which is a direct fallout of the intervention made by His Excellency with the office of the Secretary to the Federal Government.
“It would be recalled that the administration of Governor Bello Mohammed inherited the sum of about N900million of pension funds from the total amount received of about N2.5billion by the immediate past administration.
“However, because the Yari administration tampered with more than N1.5billion of the workers funds in paying outgoing political appointees their gratuity and some contractors, only teachers were able to be paid their refund so far, with less than N300million left for other civil servants at state and local government areas to be paid.
“But Governor Bello Mohammed intervened via an official appeal to the office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation for the release of the more than N2 billion outstanding contributions due for refund to the State civil servants which has now started bearing fruits.
“Governor Bello Muhammad assured civil servants in the state that they will continue to get their contribution refunds until every contributor is adequately refunded in spite of the misuse of their contributions by the previous administration.
“The Government has so far addressed a lot of unjust treatment of workers in the state by the immediate past administration such as the reinstatement of 1,040 civil servants neglected after employment and abandoned after employment, 556 teachers employed without being paid and promotion of all categories of workers which was dormant for several years.
“Other areas of addressing the unjust treatment of workers was the payment of leave grants to all categories of staff, something they have not enjoyed for a decade as well as punctual payment of salaries every month.
“Regarding the payment of new minimum wage of 30,000, Governor Bello Mohammed has already approved it and is now waiting for Amb. Bashir Yuguda Committee report to immediately commence its implementation.”
