Twelve years. A full cycle of childhood. A period long enough for a nation to build monuments, to forge new paths, to heal old wounds. Yet, for thousands of former heroes of Nigeria’s power sector, these twelve years have been a protracted season in purgatory. They are the former employees of the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN), the architects of what light we had, now left to wander in the shadows of a broken promise.
Their disengagement in 2013 was meant to be a rebirth—a necessary, if painful, step towards privatizing and revitalizing Nigeria’s epileptic power sector. The Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) was the executor, the government the guarantor. A severance package was negotiated, a covenant signed. But that covenant was written in invisible ink, its words fading as soon as the ink dried.
Today, the only thing that remains is an albatross of debt, a crushing weight of unpaid entitlements hung around the necks of men and women who gave their youth to power a nation. This is not just an administrative failure; it is a profound moral and emotional catastrophe.
The Anatomy of a Broken Promise
The list of outstanding payments is a scroll of indignity. It is not a request for charity; it is a demand for what is legally, morally, and ethically owed. Each line item represents a stolen dream, a deferred hope, a mounting anxiety:
· A 16 Months Gratuity:* The foundational promise, covering basic salary, housing, transport, and the very means of survival, remains a phantom.
· B & C The Pension Betrayal:** The unpaid 7.5% government pension since 2013 and the 15% pension component of 16 months. This is not merely a debt; it is a theft from their future, a deliberate sabotage of their twilight years. As the proverb goes, “An old man who fails to provide for his children has failed, but a society that fails to honor its elders is doomed.”
· D, E, F… The Catalogue of Neglect: From the 20% severance and the 13th-month salary to the repatriation allowance and long service awards. These were not bonuses; they were the earned rewards for a lifetime of service, now transformed into tokens of national ingratitude. · I & J The Final Insult:* The 10% equity share and insurance premium of #2.5 million each. This was the sweetener, the promise of a stake in the new Nigeria they helped build. Instead, it has become the most bitter pill to swallow.
The Human Casualties: Faces Behind the Figures
This is not about spreadsheet cells; it is about human cells deteriorating under the weight of stress. It is about:
· The Retired Engineer who can no longer afford his hypertension medication, his hands that once calibrated turbines now too shaky to hold a cup of tea.
· The Former Linesman who lived in the company’s barracks, now facing eviction with his family, his service yielding no roof over his head.
· The Widow whose husband died waiting, her husband’s long service award now a posthumous letter of apology that will never arrive.
· The Ailing Pensioner who visits the hospital with a folder of unpaid entitlement documents instead of a health insurance card, his body failing as his faith in the system already has.
They are the casualties of a quiet war—a war waged not with bullets, but with bureaucracy and a chilling indifference. They are the living, breathing proof of the wisdom in George Eliot’s words: “What do we live for, if it is not to make life less difficult for each other?” Our nation has done the exact opposite.
A Plea to President Bola Tinubu: The Time for Action is Now
Your Excellency, you have inherited many burdens, but few carry the stench of such prolonged injustice. You have positioned yourself as a reformer, a man of action unafraid to take difficult decisions. Here is a decision that requires not just political will, but a heart of empathy.
This is a stain on the nation’s conscience that no policy can wash away. It is a debt that, if left unpaid, accrues not interest, but curses. The great Nelson Mandela once said, “A nation should not be judged by how it treats its highest citizens, but its lowest ones.” How then, do we judge a nation that treats its former custodians of light as if they are invisible?
Mr. President, you have the power to cut this albatross loose. You can direct the BPE and the relevant ministries to:
- Constitute an Emergency Presidential Committee to immediately audit, verify, and settle these outstanding payments.
- Release a dedicated and transparent funding stream to clear this 12-year-old debt without further delay.
- Publicly acknowledge this injustice and offer a national apology to these patriots, restoring not just their funds, but their dignity.
The ex-PHCN workers are not asking for the moon. They are asking for what they earned with their sweat, their time, and their lives. To continue to ignore them is to endorse a national creed of betrayal. It is to tell every current civil servant that their service, too, will be forgotten.
The lights they once kept on for Nigeria have been extinguished in their own lives. It is time for the government to step in and restore the power—the power of justice, the power of compassion, the power of a promise finally kept. The time to pay this debt is not tomorrow. It is now, before the silence is broken only by the sound of more graves being dug.
