More than two decades after the liquidation of Nigeria Airways, the Federal Government has begun settling N18 billion in outstanding severance benefits owed to 2,700 former employees of the defunct national carrier.
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 already received their payments, while 600 beneficiaries in batches eight and nine had been cleared for payment.
“Altogether, this represents N18bn in benefits for 2,700 former workers,” the minister said.
The payments followed a directive by President Bola Tinubu to resolve the long-running obligation, according to Oyedele.
He acknowledged the hardship caused by the prolonged delay, noting that some former employees had died while waiting for their entitlements, leaving their families to pursue the payments.
“For more than two decades, following the liquidation of Nigeria Airways, many former employees have waited for their outstanding severance benefits. Some have grown old waiting. Some have sadly passed away, leaving their families to pursue what was legitimately due to them,” he said.
Oyedele said the government recognised that the settlement could not undo the impact of more than 20 years of waiting but considered it necessary to resolve inherited obligations rather than allow them to persist.
“We recognise that no payment today can fully compensate for more than two decades of waiting, but it is important that government confronts these long-standing obligations rather than allowing them to remain unresolved for another generation,” he added.
Verification precedes payment
According to the minister, the exercise followed extensive verification of beneficiaries, including biometric capture and validation of personal and banking information.
He said the process was necessary to eliminate fraudulent claims and ensure that government funds reached legitimate beneficiaries.
Further verification will be conducted in cases involving outdated records, incorrect bank details and beneficiaries who have died, Oyedele said.
Where former workers died before receiving their entitlements, payments will go to their documented next of kin or estates after the relevant legal processes are completed.
The minister said the severance benefits applied across different categories of former Nigeria Airways employees, without distinction between junior and senior workers.
Oyedele also addressed concerns over whether the benefits had been adjusted to reflect the effect of inflation over the more than two-decade period.
He said the government was settling the obligations based on amounts documented and verified, adding that there was no provision for inflation adjustment in the settlement.
While acknowledging that inflation had significantly eroded the value of money over the years, he maintained that the government was proceeding with the documented obligations.
Payments are being processed in batches, he explained, to ensure that beneficiaries whose claims have been verified do not remain unpaid while other outstanding claims undergo validation.
FG settles contractors’ debts
The Nigeria Airways payments form part of a broader Federal Government effort to clear verified inherited financial obligations, including outstanding liabilities to pensioners and indigenous contractors.
Oyedele disclosed that payments had also been made to more than 12,000 indigenous contractors with outstanding government obligations.
He said the government initially prioritised smaller contractors owed N50 million or less before extending payments to verified claims of up to N100 million.
Larger claims running into billions of naira could be handled separately through negotiations and instruments such as promissory notes, he said.
The minister explained that prioritising smaller contractors was intended to support businesses that depended on government payments to meet salaries and other immediate financial commitments.
He, however, warned contractors against paying commissions or inducements to officials to facilitate the settlement of verified claims, describing such demands as illegal.
Beyond clearing inherited debts, Oyedele said the government was working to prevent a recurrence by making annual budgets more realistic and ensuring that capital expenditure commitments were supported by identifiable funding sources.
“We will do our best to ensure that the accumulated obligations of the past do not repeat themselves,” he said.
Oyedele apologised to former Nigeria Airways employees for the prolonged delay in receiving their entitlements, stressing that the payments should not be regarded as a favour from government but as benefits legitimately owed to the workers.
