Nigerian Soldiers Owed N1bn Allowances
Nigerian Soldiers Owed N1bn Allowances
Daily Trust (Abuja)
NEWS
23 December 2007
Posted to the web 23 December 2007
By Musa Simon Reef and Benjamin Auta
Over 5,000 Nigerians who have served in peace keeping operations in Sudan’s war-torn Darfur are yet to be paid most of their allowances.
Some of the soldiers cried out in a petition that military top shots are deliberately withholding the soldiers’ allowances amounting to about N1billion.
The military authorities confirmed owing the soldiers but denied sitting on the entitlements of the troops, saying a loan has been secured and approved by the presidency to ensure that they are paid before the end of this month.
Eight Nigerian battalions are being rotated in the Darfur operations and each battalion comprises about 700 soldiers.
Sunday Trust has a copy of a petition written by one of the affected soldiers in which he alleged, among other things, that the army authoruties are yet to pay him about $1, 450, being the sum of accumulated allowances owed to him.
Based on this soldier’s petition, over 5,000 troops are yet to be paid about N1bn allowances.
According to Nigerian soldiers in Darfur, each soldier was being paid $2oo monthly when they were in Darfur, with a promise that the remaining $600 being kept for them as savings and would be paid when they return to Nigeria.
“The officers told us that we shall be paid only $200 per month and the remaining $600 would be saved for us and be paid upon our return to Nigeria. But now what we are told are pure stories to justify the delay.”
One soldier said, “While other soldiers from other countries were adequeatly taken of in Darfur, Nigerian soldiers were involved in fighting the harsh economic conditions caused by unpaid allowances and the bullets of Sudanese insurgents.”
The Director of Army Public Relations, Brigadier-General Solomon Giwa-Amu, confirmed to Sunday Turst that the soldiers who served in peace keeping operations in Darfur are being owed allowances for previous operations. But he said that there are plans by the military authorities to defray the debt.
Though he was not exact on the number of the soldiers affected, Giwa-Amu said that about eight battalions are being rotated in the Darfur Peace Keeping Operation.
“I want to agree with you that soldiers who have served in Darfur are being owed some allowances,” he told Sunday Trust. “I think we have had eight battalions. I want to make it abundantly clear that these are not the normal salaries of the soldiers. So, while they are out in peace operation mission, their normal salaries have been running constantly and paid as when due. The transportation of the soldiers in peace keeping mission is borne by the Federal Government.
“The soldiers are still kitted by the government their medical care are still being taken care by the government. So, these allowances are extraneous to their normal entitlements back home and other allowances in the mission area. It is not the responsibility of the Nigerian government to pay the allowances of these soldiers; it is the responsibility of the United Nations, and in this case, the African Union to pay these allowances. What happens is that it is only when the AU pays Nigeria that the soldiers get paid.”
The Army Spokesman who attributed the delay in paying the allowances to delays and errors in the processing of these allowances and that is why they have not been paid as when due.
Giwa-Amu said the Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen Luka Nyeh Yusuf, has secured the approval for a loan from the Presidency to pay off the soldiers.
“What the present Chief of Army Staff has done is to secure a loan from the Presidency which has been approved which I think by now should have hit our banks accounts ready for payment to the soldiers. I know if the money has not hit our accounts, then I think it should be before the end of December so that the soldiers would be paid their allowances before the end of this year. The soldiers being owed allowance should note that the present hierarchy of the army will never be involved in stealing their allowances,” Giwa-Amu said.
He said with effect from November 1, 2007, President Umaru Yar’Adua has approved a new allowance of $1,028 every month for each soldier serving in Darfur. The presidency, according to Giwa-Amu, has agreed to pay Nigerian soldiers in Darfur in full.
On the JP Morgan account in Chase Manhattan Bank, Giwa-Amu revealed that the account is no longer being managed by the Army but the Nigerian Permanent Mission in the UN.
“JP Morgan Account is the account that is kept at Chase Manhattan Bank which is incidentally was under my purview when I was the Defence Advicer in the UN. When the democratic government of former President Olusegun Obasanjo came into power, he directed that that account should not be maintained by the Defence Ministry but that it should be maintained and operated by Nigerian Permanent Mission to the UN directly. The process now is the UN pays the money into the permanent mission account and the permanent mission now remits the money into the Federal Government treasury directly and immediately.
“The Nigeria Army does not have anything to do with that account any more. The UN pays Nigeria for ‘renting’ Nigerian soldiers. So, it is the responsibility of Nigeria to now decide how much should be paid to the soldiers. The money does not belong to Nigerian soldiers but the country entirely and now at the discretion of the government to ascertain the amount to be paid to the soldiers as allowances,” the Army Spokesman said.