Retirees Appeal to FG for Increased Minimum Pension, Wage Award paymentsÂ
The Nigeria Union of Pensioners (NUP) has called on President Bola Tinubu to instruct the National Salaries, Income and Wages Commission to implement the new minimum pension, in line with the recently passed minimum wage law for workers.
The NUP has also requested that the Federal Government fulfill its promise from last year to provide retirees with N25,000 to mitigate the effects of the fuel subsidy removal.
The government had previously committed to giving federal workers N35,000 and retirees N25,000 as wage awards for six months starting in October 2023, as a form of relief. While the payments were made to workers and some states adhered to this, retirees have not received their share.
The wage awards for workers have ended, pending the implementation of the new minimum wage law.
NUP spokesman Bunmi Ogunkolade expressed frustration over the lack of progress despite numerous appeals through proper channels. Ogunkolade mentioned that the NUP has made several formal requests and visits to the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation, and has also approached the National Assembly for resolution.
Ogunkolade did acknowledge a 20% pension increase for January to August 2024 that retirees have received and thanked the federal government for this increase, describing it as unprecedented.
He concluded by expressing hope that the remaining issues—palliative payments and the new minimum pension—will be addressed soon.
“We have written several letters to the ministry of humanitarian affairs and poverty alleviation. We’ve paid different courtesy visit to the ministry, all to no avail. We were told that our matter was hanging because of what happened in the ministry.
“We’ve also lodged our complaints to the national assembly. We met with the Chairman, House committee on Pension. We’re using this medium again to appeal to them, to give us the wage award and resolve the issue of minimum pension,” Ogunkolade said.
The NUP spokesman, however, acknowledged that pensioners have received 20% pension increment meant for January to August 2024 in their various bank account, while thanking the federal government on behalf of NUP about the development.
He stated, “We are using this medium to appreciate the federal government being led by President Bola Tinubu for fulfilling his promise to effect 20% increment on the monthly pension of our members, this is unprecedented.
“We hope that other two pending issues – palliative and ‘minimum pension’ as mentioned above would be attended to as well.”
