Omo-Agege is also the Deputy Senate President of Nigeria.
A crisis is rocking the Delta State association of pensioners and retirees under the aegis of Association of Contributory Retirees (ACR) following the endorsement of the state All Progressives Congress (APC) governorship candidate, Ovie Omo-Agege in the 2023 general elections by the leadership of the association.
Omo-Agege is also the Deputy Senate President of Nigeria.
The ACR, made up of pensioned and retired primary school teachers and local government workers in the state, is led by its chairperson, Helen Ejieh.
According to Ejieh, it has over 50,000 members.
Last week, the association endorsed Omo-Agege during a town hall meeting at Opute Hall, Ozoro, headquarters of Isoko South Local Government of the state.
But condemning the association's purported endorsement of the APC governorship candidate, pensioners and retirees of the Local Government Contributory Retirees, under ACR, disassociated themselves from the endorsement.
Denouncing the endorsement, a press statement signed by the state chairman of Local Government Contributory Retirees, an arm of the ACR, Daniel Onosanimoni and its secretary, Godwin Ekenini, said, "We the Local Government arm of the Association of Contributory Retirees (ACR) wish to outrightly dissociate our members from the meeting between Mrs. Helen Ejieh, chairman, Contributory Retirees (Local Education Authorities/Primary Schools Retirees), her supporters/group (among the LEA/Primary School Retirees) and the gubernatorial candidate of the APC in Delta state, DSP Ovie Omo-Agege.
"We completely disown the contents of the press release/publicity that followed the said meeting as we remain neutral and apolitical in our approach and agitations for the payment of our pension entitlement.
“The Local Government Contributory Retirees is composed of all categories of local government employees who retired from the local government service of Delta state and are yet to draw their pensions, as a body we were not consulted nor was a part of the meeting at Ozoro, therefore the teachers group of ACR cannot speak for us nor serve as our mouth piece.
"We object to the use of our umbrella Association and name in the promotion of the interests of a political party (the APC), among political parties on ground in Delta state. While we concede that no pensioner of Delta state ought to be owed pensions, having served for 35 years or attained the age of 60 years, we therefore use this medium to urge the state government to expedite action with the Technical Committee put in place to clear the backlog of pension and gratuities owed the Local Government Retirees in the state.
"Whatever resolution reached is for the primary school teachers and should not be misconstrued as the decision of all local government retirees.
“We are a non-partisan body that is poised for the payment of the pensions and gratuities of our members using only known legal and constitutional channels to press home our demands and we have not resorted to party politics by endorsing any political party or any governorship candidate for that matter. We do not begrudge any person or group of persons from associating or holding political opinions.”
The association commended the state government for the “release of the two tranches of N2.5 billion each making a total of N5 billion lately for the payment of the accrued rights of local government and primary school teachers in the state”.