“Pay us our money” -Osun pensioners protest non-payment of entitlements

Osun State pensioners on Tuesday took to the streets to protest non-payment of entitlements.

The aggrieved pensioners stormed the Ogun State Government Secretariat at Abere, holding placards that displayed their agitations.

One of the placards which addressed the state Governor, Gboyega Oyetola, read, “Gov. Oyetola, Stop this lying and fake promises. Pay us our money.”

In its second-quarter 2019 report, the National Pension Commission published states that were not remitting pension under the Contributory Pension Scheme.

In an analysis by this reporter, 24 states including Cross River, Enugu, Abia, Ebonyi, Taraba, Bauchi, Borno, Adamawa, Ogun, Niger, Imo, Sokoto, Kogi, Bayelsa, Nasarawa, Oyo, Katsina, Akwa Ibom, Benue, Kwara, Plateau and Taraba have not been remitting Pension contributions to the PFAs.

According to PenCom, only four out of the remaining 12 states that are remitting pension contributions, had been remitting the pension of their workers ‘regularly’.

Only Lagos, Edo, Kaduna and Federal Capital Territory (FCT) had an up-to-date remittance in the report released in August.

Osun State, according to the report, remitted pension contributions ”but in an inconsistent manner resulting in a backlog of pension contributions.”

It described the state government’s funding of accrued pension rights as ‘inadequate’, noting that this had resulted in huge arrears of accrued rights. Osun State, it added, had no group life insurance policy.