Emiola Osifeso
A widow from Ijebu-Ode, Ogun State, Mrs. Adetola Olayide-Asipa, has accused the management of Sikiru Adetona College of Education, Science and Technology of withholding her late husband’s gratuity and entitlements eight years after his death.
Speaking in an interview, Mrs. Olayide Asipa recounted how her late husband, Olusoji Olayide-Asipa, joined Tai Solarin College of Education in May 2006 before being transferred to the newly created Sikiru Adetona College of Education, Science and Technology. Until his death on September 23, 2017, he served as the institution’s Principal Registrar.
She narrated that her husband sustained internal injuries from a staff bus accident in April 2016 while returning from work in Omu-Ijebu. Although no life was lost immediately after the accident, his health deteriorated over time. He was treated at the Ijebu-Ode General Hospital, later referred to the Ogun State Teaching Hospital in Sagamu, and eventually to the Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH), where he died a year later.
Following his death, Mrs. Olayide Asipa said she began processing his gratuity as instructed by the school, submitting several documents including his employment letter, a next-of-kin form, and a letter of administration from the High Court in Abeokuta. However, the process was restarted when a new administration came into power in Ogun State, forcing her to repeat the entire exercise at great financial and emotional cost.
She revealed that her late husband was owed 48 months of net arrears and three months’ unpaid salaries, in addition to an unimplemented promotion. There were also unresolved deductions from a cooperative society during the restructuring of the institution, which she said the management blamed for delays in releasing benefits.
“To date, I have not received my husband’s gratuity or any other entitlement from the college. Even his salary for the month he died was withheld. The only money I got from the school was N20,000 as a burial contribution,” she lamented.
According to her, officials of the National Pension Commission (PenCom) told her that the delay was due to a change in government, claiming that the current administration would not pay benefits owed under the previous one. “One officer even told me to just go and pray,” she said.
Mrs. Olayide-Asipa, now left to fend for five children, two sets of twins and their elder sister described her struggle to provide for her family as overwhelming. She said she works as a low-cadre civil servant and engages in petty trading, while her children take on odd jobs to support the household.
“I have taken multiple loans from cooperatives and microfinance banks just to survive. I am neck-deep in debt, but I refuse to let my children drop out of school. I pay their fees in instalments, sometimes with shame, but I keep pushing,” she said with emotion.
The widow called on the Ogun State government and the management of Sikiru Adetona College of Education, Science and Technology to release her late husband’s gratuity and entitlements, saying that the prolonged delay has left her family in hardship.
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