FG Pays N18bn To 2,700 Ex-Nigeria Airways Workers

The Federal Government has begun paying N18 billion in outstanding severance benefits to 2,700 former employees of the defunct Nigeria Airways, more than 20 years after the national carrier was liquidated.

The Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Taiwo Oyedele, disclosed this on Friday during a press briefing at the Federal Ministry of Finance in Abuja.

Oyedele said 2,100 former workers covered by batches one to seven had received their payments, while another 600 beneficiaries in batches eight and nine had been cleared for payment.

He said the total amount involved in the exercise was N18 billion for the 2,700 beneficiaries.

The minister noted that many former Nigeria Airways workers had waited for decades to receive their entitlements. Some had grown old during the prolonged process, while others died before their outstanding benefits were paid, leaving their families to pursue the claims.

He said the payment was being made following President Bola Tinubu’s directive to resolve the long-running obligation owed to the former workers.

Oyedele acknowledged that the settlement could not make up for the more than two decades the beneficiaries had waited, but said the government had decided to address inherited financial obligations instead of allowing them to remain unresolved.

The minister explained that the exercise was part of the Federal Government’s wider effort to settle verified inherited obligations, including outstanding payments owed to pensioners and indigenous contractors.

He said extensive verification had been carried out before the payments, including biometric registration and checks on beneficiaries’ personal and banking information to prevent fraudulent claims.

According to him, additional verification would be conducted in cases involving outdated records, incorrect bank details and beneficiaries who had died. Their next of kin or estates would be required to complete the necessary legal procedures before payments could be made.

On whether the benefits had been adjusted to reflect inflation over the more than 20-year period, Oyedele said the government was settling the amounts based on the obligations documented and verified.

He acknowledged that inflation had greatly reduced the value of the money over the years but said the settlement did not provide for inflation adjustments.

The minister said payments were being released in batches so that beneficiaries whose claims had already been verified would not have to wait for the completion of validation processes involving other claims.

He added that the benefits covered different categories of former Nigeria Airways employees, with no distinction between junior and senior workers.

For workers who died before receiving their benefits, Oyedele said their documented next of kin or other eligible beneficiaries would receive the payments after completing the required legal processes.

The minister also disclosed that the Federal Government had settled outstanding debts owed to more than 12,000 indigenous contractors as part of its efforts to reduce accumulated obligations.

He said smaller contractors with verified claims of N50 million or less were initially prioritised, while the government later extended the payment process to contractors with verified claims of up to N100 million.

According to Oyedele, larger claims running into billions of naira could be handled separately through negotiations and financial instruments such as promissory notes.

He said the approach was designed to give priority to small businesses that depend on government payments to pay workers’ salaries and meet other immediate financial obligations.

Oyedele warned contractors against giving commissions or inducements to government officials to facilitate the payment of verified claims, saying such demands were illegal.

He added that the government was also working to prevent the recurrence of unpaid obligations by adopting more realistic budgeting and ensuring that capital expenditure commitments were supported by identifiable sources of funding.

The minister apologised to former Nigeria Airways workers for the prolonged delay in receiving their entitlements, stressing that the payments were owed benefits and should not be regarded as government favours.