By Gloria Fraser, MFR
Twenty-three years is long enough for a worker to grow old waiting for justice.
For some former employees of the defunct Nigeria Airways Limited, it was tragically too long. Some died waiting for benefits earned through years of service to their country. Others entered their seventies, eighties and even nineties carrying a grievance that survived successive administrations.
Now, under President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, payments have finally commenced.
The significance goes beyond money. It is about the dignity of labour and whether government should honour obligations to citizens after their working years are over.
Nigeria Airways was liquidated in 2003. Its former workers subsequently endured years of protests, appeals and partial settlements. The outstanding severance balance was reported at about ₦36 billion.
President Tinubu approved settlement of the outstanding entitlement, but implementation itself encountered frustrating bureaucratic delays. As recently as August, the former workers were still waiting.
That history should not be airbrushed.
But neither should the breakthrough now occurring be ignored.
The Air Transport Services Senior Staff Association of Nigeria has confirmed that some former Nigeria Airways workers have begun receiving payments. Its National President, John Ogbe, commended Tinubu and Aviation Minister Festus Keyamo for helping move the process forward.
The Aviation Safety Round Table Initiative has similarly welcomed the intervention while correctly urging government to ensure that every remaining eligible beneficiary—and the families of deceased workers—is paid.
That qualification matters. Commencement should be applauded; completion must be demanded.
FROM PENSIONERS TO THE CLASSROOM
Almost simultaneously, another worker-welfare commitment is being implemented.
The Federal Government has released funds for the full Consolidated Academic Tools Allowance covering January to August 2026 for eligible academic staff in federal universities, polytechnics and colleges of education.
Education Minister Dr Tunji Alausa says the payment implements agreements reached with academic unions and supports expenditure essential to teaching, research and professional development.
Consider the contrast.
One obligation originated from a national airline liquidated more than two decades ago. The other arises from contemporary agreements intended to strengthen Nigeria’s tertiary institutions.
One looks backward to correct an inherited injustice; the other looks forward by investing in those responsible for educating the next generation.
Together, they illuminate an important principle of governance: a government cannot choose only the debts and responsibilities that are politically convenient.
GOVERNANCE WITH A HUMAN FACE
Economic reform is often discussed through statistics—GDP, inflation, reserves, revenues and exchange rates. Those indicators matter.
But behind every government balance sheet are human beings.
A pensioner waiting for an entitlement does not experience government as a fiscal table. A lecturer struggling to acquire books, access research or attend professional conferences does not measure governance solely by macroeconomic indicators.
They experience government through whether institutions work and commitments are honoured.
This is where the Tinubu administration’s humanitarian credentials deserve attention.
Critics have every right to interrogate the hardship associated with economic reforms. Indeed, government itself must remain conscious that improving macroeconomic numbers mean little to citizens unless improvements eventually reach households.
But fairness requires that compassion in governance also be recognised when it occurs.
Settling a 23-year-old obligation that could easily have been passed to yet anotherh administration demonstrates a willingness to confront inherited human problems rather than simply inherited economic statistics.
THE NATIONAL PATRIOTS POSITION
The National Patriots believes leadership should ultimately be judged by what it does for people.
President Tinubu did not create the Nigeria Airways pension problem. Several administrations inherited it. His administration nevertheless bears responsibility for ensuring that the payment it approved reaches every legitimate beneficiary.
The commencement of payment is therefore commendable, but the job is not finished until all verified beneficiaries—including families of deceased former workers—receive their entitlements.
Similarly, fulfilling academic-welfare commitments should contribute to stability, productivity and improved standards across our tertiary institutions.
There is an old principle that a society reveals its values by how it treats those who have served it.
President Tinubu’s intervention offers something more powerful than another promise: action after decades of waiting.
For the National Patriots, compassionate leadership, willingness to confront inherited obligations and commitment to workers strengthen the case for continuity.
A President who remembers citizens whom the system forgot deserves recognition—and, where performance continues, the opportunity to finish the work.
Dr. G. Fraser. MFR
Headlinenews.News Special Report.
