Recently on a visit to Ilaji Hotels and Resorts in the Ona Ara area of Ibadan, I was left completely dumbfounded by a disclosure by the driver who took me and some colleagues to the resort. Knowing that he was a police retiree, I had thought that he was maybe a sergeant. As it turned out, however, he is a retired superintendent of police. Why would a retired SP be driving a Micra for daily bread? He told me that his pension was a mere N35,000 per month! I could not believe my ears. Indeed, he told me that his wife doubted his pay until he showed her his pay slip.
As we chatted, my mind immediately summoned the story of Juana Barraza, a notorious Mexican serial killer currently serving a 759-year sentence for killing 16 elderly women. Barraza was just 13 years old when her alcoholic mother, who incidentally had her at 13, reportedly exchanged her for three beers to a man who repeatedly raped her, and by whom she had a son. Unable to get over her mother’s cruelty to her, Barraza joined the world of wrestling, then began murdering lonely women aged 60 and above, posing as a caregiver. Barazza’s life is such a sad one—her eldest son was beaten to death with a baseball bat—but she is for me only a metaphor. It seems to me that Nigeria parades a serial killer in the form of pension law that treats police retirees and others like dirt, killing them for sport.
In this country, we have a so-called pension law that ultimately only enriches the Pension Fund Administrators (PFAs). After working for years and retiring from 50 upwards, you don’t get reasonable access to your own money. To make a lump sum withdrawal of more than 25 per cent of your RSA balance, the law says “the amount left in the RSA after such lump sum withdrawal shall be sufficient to fund a programmed withdrawal of life annuity of not less than 50 percent of the retiree’s monthly remuneration as at the date of retirement.”
On a daily basis, we are currently barraged with articles portraying the desire of police retirees to live decent lives as a crime. We are told by the National Pension Commission (PenCom) that the Federal Government’s liability under the Contributory Pension Scheme (CPS) currently stands at N213.4 billion, and that presidential endorsement of the police pension bill would balloon it. PenCom’s grouse is that the proposed establishment of a Police Pension Board cannot be accommodated under the CPS, but it is no longer news that shortly before it wound up, the Ahmad Lawan-led National Assembly actually passed the Police Pension Board (Establishment) Bill, 2022 jointly sponsored by Senators Ishaku Abbo (Adamawa North) and Mohammed Ali Ndume (Borno South). The bill seeks the establishment of a Police Pension Board to serve as an exit plan for the NPF from the CPS. On its part, the House of Reps endorsed a bill for an act to amend the Pension Reform Act 2014 to exempt the NPF from the CPS.
Police retirees cried out because of the poor quantum of benefits payable to them under the CPS, an issue PenCom thinks should only be addressed via an upward review of pension contributions. I have to admit that its fears are genuine: the action would make other agencies to seek an exit from the CPS and reduce the pool of investible funds. But Pencom seems to miss a salient point: the desire for a decent sum on retirement is only logical, and it is ridiculous to hold that the law is good but no one wants it. It is inconceivable that while the military and intelligence services are exempted from the CPS by virtue of Section 5 of the Pension Reform Act (PRA) 2014, other agencies that seek such an exit are somehow doing the nation a disservice. Already, a proposed legislation titled: ‘Bill for an Act to Amend the Pension Reform Act, 2014, to Exclude/Exempt the National Assembly Service from the Contributory Pension Scheme and Establish the National Assembly Service Pension Board; and for Related Matters’ is in the works. Although PenCom and other stakeholders have hidden under the question of the financial burden the bill poses to the government, their real interest seems to lie in retaining the pool of long-term investible funds accumulated under the CPS. That requires negotiation.
Aisha Dahir-Umar, the PenCom boss, would have Nigerians believe that the agency already has provisions that could address whatever grievances the police retirees have, but that is not the case. Indeed, as Dahir-Umar was battling with the police headache, another migraine surfaced in the Bill for an Act to Amend Sections 1 (c), 7 (2), 8 (1), 18, 24 and 99 of the Pension Reform Act Cap 50 LFN 2014 by providing that a pensioner shall receive at least 75 per cent of his retirement benefits immediately upon retirement. If you tell me that the proposed bills basically seek to undermine the essence of pensions and social security cover as enshrined in the 1999 (as amended), I would reply that the constitution is not a cudgel. By the way, I like the fact that the PenCom boss acknowledged the absence of social security benefits in the country as being behind the clamour by the retirees. But I don’t think that increment in salary will douse the agitation; the law requires review.
The Obasanjo government, which reportedly modelled the CPS after the Chile Pension Scheme, ignored the fact that the Chilean scheme exempted both the armed forces and the police from the scheme. I don’t see why the NPF has to be under the scheme while the DSS is granted a waiver. The NPF is also an intelligence agency. Being a police retiree should not mean a passport to penury. President Bola Tinubu should sign the bill without delay.
For Sylvester Madu
Since a video clip of this veteran actor selling okrika (second hand clothing) in Enugu surfaced, some social media loudmouths have done their utmost to batter his image. But my respect for this honest man has only grown. There is no shame in hard work, and the fools who think he is too big to sell okrika in the open should build him a store and fill it with customers, or shut up permanently. Selling okrika is better than living a fake life and freaking out when the tax man comes calling. This is a country where “actresses” selling amala buy multiple range rovers. I laugh in Spanish.
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