Reps tell ministry to absorb 176 NIS tragedy victims

The House of Representatives on Tuesday asked the Ministry of Interior to “immediately” comply with the presidential directive to employ the victims of the 2014 Nigerian Immigration Service recruitment stampede in order to put an end to the national embarrassment caused by the tragedy.

A three-man panel of the House headed by the Majority Leader, Mr. Femi Gbajabiamila, gave the directive in Abuja, asking the ministry to liaise with the Immigration/Prisons Service Board to ensure that the victims were absorbed into the NIS.

Other members of the panel are the Minority Leader, Mr. Leo Ogor; and former Chairman, House Committee on Judiciary, Mr. Aminu Shagari.

Fifteen job seekers had died nationwide during the stampede in March 2014, while 131 others sustained injuries.

Former President Goodluck Jonathan had directed that three members of the family of each dead victim should be given employment while those who sustained injuries among the job seekers should be offered automatic employment.

The NIS calculated the total number of the beneficiaries to be 176.

However, the presidential directive had not been complied with over one year after the incident, forcing the beneficiaries to protest to the National Assembly on Thursday last week.

It turned out that though some of the beneficiaries actually got letters of employment, the process was not formalised.

The House panel gave the directive on Tuesday after it heard “shocking” comments by the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Interior, Mr. Abubakar Magaji, who claimed that the presidential directive was not backed by a “letter of approval.”

Speaking for the panel, Gbajabiamila expressed disbelief that a government agency would sit on a presidential directive on the excuse that it was waiting for another approval.

He said, “It is in your own interest to give effect to the presidential directive by employing the 176 beneficiaries immediately.

“Work out their salaries and include everything in your 2016 budget and forward to the House.

“We will withhold your 2016 budget if it comes without a provision for these 176 stampede victims. You are advised.”

Ogor also noted that the interior ministry, the board and the NIS should be “ashamed” of the national tragedy instead of allowing “unnecessary technicalities” to stall a presidential directive.

“All you are saying are technicalities; what happened that day was an embarrassment to the whole nation. This was an issue of an abnormal situation. There was a presidential directive, which was not obeyed,” the lawmaker said.

The permanent secretary had defended the non-compliance with the presidential directive on the grounds that there was no formal letter of approval from the former President to back the directive.

He claimed that the letters of employment being bandied by some of the victims were “ceremonial” and were only given out in the hope that they would be formalised by a “final approval” from the President.

“The letters issued were ceremonial; symbolic, but I asked the board to quickly follow it with a letter to Mr. President to formalise the appointments so that salaries can be processed for these people,” Magaji stated.

But, the House committee members disagreed with him, saying that it was taken for granted that there was a budget for the recruitment before the NIS embarked on it.

Gbajabiamila stated, “This thing is taking a whole new dimension. Don’t allow people go away with the impression that the original immigration recruitment was a scam.

“Where were you supposed to get salaries in the first place to pay those to be recruited?

“Why are you now saying that there should have been another presidential approval before you could process salaries for the 176 victims?”

But, Magaji stood his ground, arguing that having worked in the civil service for about 32 years, he knew there was no way the victims would get a salary without the presidential approval.

He explained that this was due to the fact that the case of the victims was handled by the Presidential Committee on Immigration stampede and not the board.

He added that in a situation where the function of the board was taken over by a committee, any recommendations of the presidential committee would revert to the President for approval before payments would be effected by the Budget Office of the Federation.

The House panel will report its findings and recommendations to the House on Thursday (tomorrow).