By Nathaniel Zacchaeus, Abuja
Retirees of the Nigeria Police under the Contributory Pension Scheme have protested to the National Assembly to complain over several months of unpaid pensions and their mandatory inclusion in the Contributory Pensions Scheme.
The retirees, who said they are from various state chapters, lamented the severe hardships faced due to the failure of the National Pension Commission to pay their entitlements.
The retired police officers reiterated their position on the need for the Federal Government to remove them from the contributory pension scheme.
Their leader, Mr Christopher Effiong, who retired as a Superintendent of Police and national coordinator, said they were at the National Assembly Complex to press forward their agitation that has been with the Legislature.
Offiong, who is also the Chairman of Cross River State Chapter of Police Retirees said the agitation had been with the National Assembly for the past three years.
He said, “For over a decade now, Nigeria Police Force (NPF) Retirees under the Contributory Pension Scheme (CPS), have painstakingly, lawfully, and peacefully been agitating to be given the rightful placement in the Defined Benefits Scheme (DBS).
“The premise under which most of us enlisted in the NPF guarantees the payment of pension and gratuity to an officer upon retirement. We believe that our peaceful and legal approach to this agitation should not be taken for granted.
“We must also appreciate both the members of the Upper and the Lower Chambers who have also painstakingly taken the matter through several sessions of legislative actions over investigative hearings, public hearings, and passage of Police Exit Bull CPS and Police Pension Board Bill in our favour – privately initiated bills by Sen and Hon Francis Waive of the Senate and House of Representatives in the 9th NASS.
“We agitated that we should be exempted from contributing to pension schemes such as their counterparts from other security agencies like armed forces and other intelligence communities. This scheme has sent a lot of our retirees to the grave.
“We have a bill here, Bill to exit contributing pension scheme, that Bill had been here for over two years, it has passed first reading, second reading, we came here for a public hearing, but till today, nothing is happening, not is done. If it is a conspiracy by the Nigerian government to kill us, then let us die here. We are dying, we cannot feed our family.”
Addressing the aggrieved protesters, the Vice Chairman of the Senate Common Police Affairs, Senator Yinusa Akintunde, who sympathized with retired police personnel, said the National Assembly is currently holding a meeting with Police authority to resolve the problem.
He said, “We thanked you sincerely, what you are doing this morning is a legal means of expressing your feelings. You are trying to let the nation know the situation of the police retirees and there is no crime in what you are doing this morning, you are exercising your right.
“Let me inform you, the truth is that, as of this morning, we met twice, the committee of the National Assembly and the Committee of the IG, and the bill you are talking about is the 9th assembly bill, is no more in existence as of today, because it was never assented to, but some arrangements are on to resolve the problem.
“You are fathers, brothers, and mothers, we cannot allow you to suffer, we are going to meet with some of you now to find a way out,” said Akintunde.
