A petition has surfaced urging the Federal Government to pay former staffs of the defunct Nigerian Airways.
The petition, which was issued by former staffs of the Nigerian Airways also called on President Muhammadu Buhari to bring back the national carrier.
Since 2003, Nigeria has been left without a national carrier in the aviation sector and for about 11 years and counting, the staff of the defunct national carrier, Nigeria Airways, have gone from being proud civil servants and patriotic countrymen to
A member of the former staff organisation noted that the Nigerian airways lasted 47 years and recorded just nine incidence; three fatal crashes, one hijack among others. With the exit of Nigerian Airways, within 52 days, there were five fatal crashes; from EAS to bellview and Dana.
The petition, which reads in part below, can be signed here
We, the members of, “United Nigeria Airways Union”, staff of former Nigeria Airways Ltd, do make an appeal to the President Muhammad Buhari, President and Commander In Chief of the Armed Forces of Federal Republic of Nigeria, to kindly use your God given positions, to pay the entitlements of former Nigeria Airways staff in liquidation to end their long sufferings of the former workers who for no reason of their own, are left to fend for themselves and made to undergo untold hardship since 2003 when the airline was liquidated, and bring back Nigeria Airways
The former workers of the airline were made to suffer, with so many of its members dead from common ailments that are ordinarily suppose not to results to death, families driven out of rented apartments and taken to sleeping on the streets across Nigeria, children driven out of schools and turned to street beggars and or hoodlums, women turn to widows with no place to put their heads and their children. The suffering is endless and as fathers, mothers, and representatives of collective will of Nigerians, you can imagine the pain, august and despair, these, once hard working staff of former Nigeria Airways, who gave better part of their productive lives to the service of their motherland are made to undergo.
As at November 2013, it is estimated that about 900 former Nigeria Airways staff were reported to have died of frustration.