BAO Pandering To PAN: Pulverising A Promising Legacy

By Idowu Oguntuashe

In the first two years of his tenure, Ekiti State Governor, Biodun Abayomi Oyebanji (BAO), appeared set to establish a commendable legacy in the treatment of workers and pensioners.

His early interventions raised expectations of a decisive break from the neglect that had defined government and labour relations in the state.

Regrettably, that expectation is being undermined by a series of actions that raise troubling questions about priorities, judgment, and the responsible exercise of executive power.

Context:

With the notable exception of that of Segun Oni, successive Ekiti administrations have shown limited sensitivity to the welfare of workers and pensioners. 

Under Adebayo, workers absorbed the shock of fiscal austerity through half-salary payments. 

Fayose notoriously typified pensioners as Òkúgùrò (living corpses). 

Fayemi entrenched seizure of privileges by treating certain statutory entitlements as discretionary. 

The cumulative outcome is well known as Ekiti pensioners today receive the lowest take-home pensions in Nigeria.

The Segun Oni administration stood in sharp contrast. It cleared pension arrears dating back to the creation of Ekiti State and introduced mechanism for the payment of gratuities within months of retirement. 

Following his exit from office, however, gratuity liabilities again accumulated. 

By 2023 when Oyebanji assumed office, the backlog of gratuities for state and local government pensioners had grown to over N48 billion, with retirees who had left service up to ten years earlier still awaiting payment.

During the 2022 election campaign, Governor Oyebanji publicly pledged to address this long-standing injustice. 

To his credit, his administration has succeeded in paying gratuities up to 2015, and for certain parastatals and specific categories, payments have reached 2019. 

However, for many retirees—some of whom exited service over eleven years ago—payments are still outstanding.

BAO has also paid salary arrears and leave bonuses that went unpaid under Fayose and Fayemi. 

In short, things were moving slowly but positively for Ekiti pensioners until trouble erupted within the Ekiti State chapter of the National Union of Pensioners (NUP). 

It is increasingly obvious that the BAO administration is complicit in the lingering crisis.

The NUP Delegates’ Conference and Suspected Leadership Failure:

The dispute started at the Ekiti State NUP delegates’ conference on November 28, 2024. 

The auditor and union members had raised concerns about discrepancies in the financial records presented by the outgoing State Administrative Council (SAC) led by Mr Joel Olomi Akinola. 

In response, national NUP officials present at the conference postponed the scheduled election and constituted a panel to examine the union’s financial records.

According to the committee’s report, which informed subsequent decisions, significant governance and financial management lapses were identified.

These included deficiencies in internal controls, transactions lacking proper documentation, the use of personal bank accounts for union transactions, and irregularities connected with funds raised and donations received during the 2024 Pensioners’ Day activities. 

The report also raised concerns about allowances paid to union officials and discrepancies in the remittance of check-off dues to local NUP branches.

Based on these findings, the committee recommended sanctions against key members of the outgoing NUP leadership, including disqualification from future union elections for a defined period. 

A rescheduled conference was later held, at which new officers were elected to manage the affairs of the NUP in Ekiti State.

Parallel Structures and Government Conduct:

Instead of contesting the report through the courts or established union mechanisms, members of the sanctioned leadership went on to form a parallel organisation—the Pensioners Association of Nigeria (PAN)—which began presenting itself as an alternative voice for pensioners in Ekiti State.

Thereafter, the state government withheld check-off dues from the NUP and later stopped their deduction entirely. 

Whatever the stated justification, this decision has had the practical effect of severely weakening the recognised union and has raised legitimate questions about the government’s neutrality in an intra-union dispute.

Any residual claim of official distance became more difficult to sustain when, in December 2025, PAN organised an end-of-year gathering described as a prayer meeting. 

The presence of senior government officials (the special adviser on pensions, the special adviser on labour matters, and representatives from the Office of the Head of Service), labour leaders, and the father of the Governor gave the event a distinctly political character. 

Addressing the gathering, Mr Akinola, the leader of PAN, spoke of a new beginning anchored on transparency and collective welfare—remarks that stood in sharp contrast to the unresolved findings that precipitated their removal from NUP leadership.

The argument in government circle might be that no legal authority had pronounced the Akinola-led union executive guilty of any crime or wrongdoing. That position would be glossing over the moral imperative in a culture that cherishes a good name more than gold or silver. 

Indeed, Mr Joel Olomi Akinola carries a double moral burden, not clearing his name of public opprobrium, and, working to ruin a Union he had headed for four years and from which he had benefitted a lot. 

An elder like him should not embrace the scorched-earth principle of ‘kàkà k’eku má jẹ sèsé, á fi ş’àwàdànù’. Those backing his contrivance of deceit and division necessarily share in that moral burden.

The Larger Significance:

The broader implications are unsettling. Pensioners—among the most vulnerable segments of society—are being ridiculed for exercising the only legitimate mechanism available to them to remove distrusted leadership. 

This has a parallel implication in a governorship election period and the conduct of the BAO administration strongly suggests an assumption that re-election is certain, regardless of government behaviour and public discontent. 

After all, the gods of hunger and greed would be appeased easily with token handouts and performative generosity on election day. 

It is saying, in effect, that the pensioners whom Fayose, the Governor’s political friend, joked cruelly about, have no electoral value—neither do their relations, friends and sympathisers.

This situation also reflects a deeper challenge and the substitution of accountability with accommodation, and the management of dissent through exclusion rather than engagement. 

The situation is particularly bad in Ekiti State where the opposition seem bereft of vision, unity, and strategic coherence. 

Hence, there appears to be no counterforce to the excesses of those in power.

Against this backdrop, one questions Ekiti’s vaunted reputation for civic courage and moral clarity. The prevailing silence of many influential voices invites doubt about our capacity to speak out in moments that demand principled intervention.

Idowu Oguntuashe, A retired Ekiti Government worker