the plight of a family whose breadwinner, a policeman, died in active service.
Henry Ugiagbe died on 1 February 2009 at the Federal Medical Centre, Owo, Ondo State after an after a cardiac arrest while he was conveying some newly acquired police vehicles from Lagos to Abuja, the country’s capital city.
“Since his death, the process of getting his pension by his widow and children has been fraught with several seemingly insurmountable hurdles.
“The file of the deceased was first missing for a couple of years and when it finally surfaced, it has gone through a lengthy process between the police and Stanbic IBTC Pension Managers Limited,” the petitioner lamented.
As a result, the man’s children, according to Keyamo, have dropped out of school owing to their inability to pay their fees.
“It is in the midst of this suffering that some of your overzealous officers have given our clients an ultimatum to move out of Block 2, Flat 12, Queens Barracks, Apapa, Lagos State, or be thrown out forcefully on or before the end of August, 2014.
“On the 1st day of June, 2014, they were served with a purported notice of ejection by the Provost Marshal Office, Force Headquarters Annex, Lagos to vacate the said apartment as same has already being allocated to two police officers in the persons of one Inspector Francisca Joseph and Inspector Josiah Joseph who are currently jostling to wrestle possession from the deceased family,” the open letter said adding that several pleas to the office by the affected family had not met any positive result.
He also stated that the family could not afford accommodation outside the barracks because its members have been affected by the unpaid pension which is as “a result of the administrative bottlenecks and attendant delays and corruption that normally characterise the payments of entitlements and gratuities of retired and deceased police officers.
“These desperate officers in conjunction with the Provost Marshal in the person of one ASP James Olusola Oyewunmi, have vowed to forcefully eject the widow and the five children left behind by the Late ASP Henry Ugiagbe from the apartment as they have been given a deadline of the end of August, 2014 to vacate the said apartment or stand the risk of being forcefully thrown to the street,” the petition, with the attached notice, stated.
He wondered if it was right for an officer who served the country to be so treated further stressing that such ill-treatment would discourage living officers of the force from putting in their best.
He appealed to Abba to come to the aid of the family.
Source:PM News
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