Abuja: Concerned retirees on Monday appealed to the Ogun Government to suspend the Contributory Pension Scheme (CPS) policy. A retired public servant, Mr. Daniel Akanji, speaking on behalf of the retirees during a protest at the government office in Abeokuta, said the policy was a failed expectation. Akanji alleged that the state government had shown a nonchalant attitude toward the laws governing the implementation of the CPS. He noted that the protesters were those who retired from July this year.
According to News Agency of Nigeria, Akanji expressed that retirees who have given 35 years of service are left with nothing significant upon retirement. He argued the policy, although conceptually sound, had been problematic since its inception. Akanji pointed out issues with the 7.5 per cent salary deductions from employees and an equivalent contribution from the government, stating that successive administrations have failed in fulfilling these obligations. He highlighted that nearly 18 years of deductions remain unremitted, leaving even the best-funded accounts with barely N2 million, a sum he questioned as sustainable for retirees.
Akanji described the retirees’ plight as dire, with many reduced to begging due to unbearable conditions. He urged the state government to either postpone the policy for five years or cancel it altogether, citing past administrations’ failures in implementing the scheme effectively.
Responding to the retirees, Mrs. Arinola Adetayo, the Permanent Secretary of the Bureau of State Pensions, assured that all issues within the CPS had been addressed. Adetayo mentioned that retirees are already benefiting from state government palliatives. She emphasized that arrears of CPS deductions, along with returns on investment, would soon be credited to the Retirement Savings Accounts (RSA). Adetayo added that retirees who might not receive remittances are those who have not completed necessary documentation with the state bureau of pensions. She concluded that after the expiration of the current palliatives, which run from July to December, retirees would start receiving their monthly pensions from the appropriate account.