The latest move to ascertain genuine pensioners under Defined Benefit Scheme by the Pension Transitional Arrangement Directorate (PTAD) may perhaps be the last major verification exercise that pensioners under the old scheme would have to go through to get their pensions regularly paid and as when due.
Again, it signals a major move by PTAD, new managers of the scheme, to achieve expected transformation, bring stability and transparency in the system that hitherto was bedevilled by management challenges.
While reasonable level of success has been achieved with Police Pensions, where biometric verifications has been carried out in Northern and South-west zone, ensuring that no authentic pensioner is left out of the payroll, this will finally eradicate ghost pensioners as it goes round other zones in Nigeria.
At the recent verification held in Lagos, covering Lagos/Ogun Zone, police pensioners numbering 1,847 had their biometric verification done successfully by PTAD.
The Federal Government two years ago brought the residual schemes (Defined Benefit Scheme) under the purview of the National Pension Commission (PenCom) to permanently resolve the problems associated with the scheme, which included mismanagement, non-payment of pensions, huge pension debt, suffering of pensioners among others.
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Bukar Goni, the then head of the civil service of the federation, announced that President Goodluck Jonathan has approved the establishment of a Pension Transition Arrangement Department (PTAD) and has also appointed Nellie Mayshak as the director general of the Department.
In the circular, the Head of Service explained that the establishment of the new pension department is in line with Section 30, Sub Section (2a) of the Amended Pension Reform Act, 2004, and it will take over the management of the three of the offices presently running the old pension scheme. These are the Civil Service Pension Department, the Police Pension Office and the Customs, Immigration and Prisons Pension Office (CIPPO).
Accordingly, the director general was expected to spearhead the smooth transition of the three offices into a single pension administration and management under the supervision of the National Pension Commission (PenCom), which will directly report to the Office of the Coordinating Minister for the Economy and Minister of Finance for coordination and control.
Mayshak said at the just concluded verification exercise carried out by PTAD in Lagos that out of 2,321 police pensioners expected, 1,847 had successfully done their verification.
The PTAD boss said although some of the policemen have before now been receiving their pensions, the exercise will further ensure that no authentic pensioner is left out of the payroll while ghost pensioners will be fully eradicated.
According to her, the exercise has been carried out in a painless manner such that the pensioners are not made to queue.
She disclosed that the Directorate commenced the verification exercise December 8, last year from the Northern zone of the country, noting that the exercise had been completed in the zone. She added that while the Directorate has commenced the exercise in the South-West, other geopolitical zones will also be done so that by the end of the first quarter of this year, they would have finished verifying all police pensioners in the country.
She said they started with police pensioners because of their large number and would carry out the same exercise for the civil service pension, immigration and prisons pension; and pension departments/board of trustees of all federally funded parastatals.
Roz Benokagbue, director, pension support department of the Directorate, said during the exercise that the Directorate concluded with Lagos pensioners on Thursday but that those who could not make it before the closing date could come to the PTAD office in Abuja.
Benokagbue said the Directorate has also been conducting the exercise for those who have health challenges in their respective homes.
She said: “We put a lot of planning into place to ensure that we have a seamless exercise. We make sure the pensioners sit down comfortably to do the verification instead of standing in the sun while we also provide them with food and drinks.
“We are taking the full biometric capture because the whole point is that we will never have to do this again. This is the only time we will call them together again for verification.
“In the future, we will just have a mild verification every six months which will only require their fingerprint. This is just to show that they are still alive. We now have their full details and information.”
She said at the moment, some pensioners on the payroll of PTAD are getting their pensions, the arrears and the 33 percent increment. “What we are trying to do is to make sure that every pensioner is being taken care of by the end of the exercise,” she noted.
