Pension Palaver-How Not To Treat Senior Citizens
I can’t seem to wrap my head around the way senior citizens are treated in our land. A man works real hard in his youthful days while the strength is still there; he grows old, and now he can get his due from people elected to show care. Lagos to Abuja, Enugu to Kano, and Benin to Ibadan; pensioners die everyday waiting for their pensions and gratuities. What kind of a country shows disrespects to her senior citizens? What kind of a country denies her retirees the opportunity to sit back and enjoy what rightfully belongs to them?
We see them every day; we help them cross the roads; especially when they are heading to Ikoyi or the popular Alausa in Ikeja. They are asked to form endless queues in the sun and when it is raining. They are told to fill out endless forms, and provide passport photographs.
Sometimes they are even asked to go back home and wait until their money or payment is ready. Sometimes they get stranded, not having enough money to return home because their hopes have been dashed. How can they return home? What are they going to tell their kids waiting for one fee or the other? How can they return home to face the gari seller they owe a lot of money?
Pensioners suffer a lot, and it doesn’t seem to matter or worry the government. Sometimes the state government blame the federal government for not coming up with their own part of the payment; while the federal in turn blames the state government. The trading blame continues, yet no one seems to care that people are dying everyday.
They die waiting for their rights; and when they do die, even their kids can’t lay claim to their father’s entitlements because they have to provide a letter of administration.
Getting a letter of administration is like passing through the eye of a needle; you need to fill a lot of forms, settle a couple of people, and pay certain percentage to a lawyer. The bank won’t let you have access to your father’s money, and the government won’t even move with compassion to make things any easier. Sometimes I wonder why there is a column for next of kin in an account opening form. Why include it when it won’t be accepted as a criterion to access someone’s account when he passes away? “Next of kin ko, next of kin ni!”
We seem to be taken our passion for not caring for the retirees these days to a new height; and if nothing is done about it as soon as possible, we may as well start worrying about our tomorrow. Those who should do something about our tomorrow to make it better are the ones mortgaging it. They are the ones who never seem to worry because they have starched away enough to secure their children’s future.
They are the ones to employ men who are over 60 years as gatemen in their companies, and pay them peanuts. They hire men old enough to be their fathers as gardeners. They hire women old enough to be their mothers as cleaners and cooks in their companies and hotels.
Since they have already secured their futures, they look the other way when pensioners queue endlessly all over the federation.
Like it or not; pensioners are not going to live forever with us; but we can make them happy the rest of their lives while they are still here. Don’t give what belongs to these people to dogs. Grey hair is wisdom they always say; and the government can draw wisdom from their wealth of experience.
