The National Youth Service Corps Sectoral Unit of the Nigeria Union of Pensioners stormed the Tribune House last week with a letter detailing their maltreatment by the management of the NYSC and the Pensions Fund Administrator, IGI. The kernel of their grouse was the quarterly instead of monthly release of their pensions but the PFA claimed it was complying with its mandate. Sulaimon Olanrewaju reports.ARE the retirees of the National Youth Service Scheme (NYSC) right or wrong to ask for monthly payment of their pensions' The answer to the poser is not as easy to conjecture as it appears given that both the leadership of the National Youth Service Corps Sectoral Unit of the Nigeria Union of Pensioners and the management of IGI, the Pension Funds Administrator, are holding different ends of the same stick. To the pensioners, pensions should be paid monthly because they are meant to be deployed in meeting daily needs, but IGI maintains that the mandate it received from the NYSC Pensioners Board of Trustees was that pensions should be paid quarterly. The NYSC pensioners, in a letter dated February 15, 2012, addressed to the Editor, Nigerian Tribune, claimed that, 'In spite of the fact that the Federal Government releases money to PFAs monthly, IGI prefers to trade with pensioners' money before releasing it to the NYSC on quarterly basis contrary to laid-down regulations that pensioners should be paid on monthly basis. Even the so-called 'quarterly payment' is observed only in the breach. In reality, NYSC pensioners are paid on the average every four to six months.... In our view, out of all the Federal Ministries, Department and Agencies (MDAs), this anomaly happens only to NYSC pensioners as a result of the mismanagement and misappropriation of our pension fund by IGI.'The pensioners, in the letter signed by Elder J.A. Adesanmi, chairman and Miss Bale Sherifat, secretary, also claimed that even when IGI released the pensions paid to it by the Budget Office, the NYSC management would hold on to the funds illegally for upward of two months.The letter stated, 'On many occasions when IGI chooses to release money to NYSC management they will not pay in time, they will delay for months. For example the last money NYSC paid was released by IGI on 3rd November, 2011, but NYSC never paid until 29th December, 2011.'They added that as a result of the failure of both the NYSC and IGI to be alive to their responsibility of prompt payment of pensioners' allowances, 'many pensioners have died, are dying, sick, bed-ridden, dehumanised and put to shame because of their inability to discharge their responsibilities to their families.'Thus the pensioners are clamouring for a change of their PFA, saying 'It is abundantly clear that IGI is incapable of performing as a PFA. Like many banks, it is in distress. It is neck deep in debt locally and internationally due to lack of integrity and good corporate governance. It is only a foolish person that will continue to put his money in a distressed bank. Any money released to IGI now will be used to offset part of its debts. If IGI is sinking, should NYSC sink with it''But in his reaction to the allegations, Mr Steve Ilo, Corporate Affairs Manager, IGI, described the pensioners' claims as spurious and baseless.According to him, 'It is the Federal Budget Office that releases pensions and it is when they release the pensions that we pay to the pensioners. These people don't seem to realise that we don't have any power over when Budget Office releases the money. It is after the Budget Office has released that we can disburse. The fact is that we don't even deal with the pensioners directly; we deal with the Board of Trustees. It was the BoT that instructed that pensions should be paid quarterly and that is why we are paying quarterly. We have paid up to December.'The pensioners also claimed that over the last 10 years, NYSC pensioners had been paid the same amount despite the pension's review of 2003, 2007 and 2010. 'All federal MDAs have carried out review of their pensions except NYSC. Over the years, inflation, especially arising from the recent partial removal of the fuel subsidy, had seriously eroded the value of our meagre pensions. Again, the Budget Office had confirmed that 50 per cent of the total money for the payment of 2003 and 2007 harmonised pension arrears had been released to IGI. The money is yet to be released to NYSC pensioners by IGI. The critical question is what is IGI doing with our pensions fund released monthly by the Federal Government''Tracing the genesis of the delay in the payment of their pensions, the former NYSC employees stated that IGI entered into an agreement with the NYSC to invest N1billion in any venture with the hope of turning around the money but this had not been realised as a result of economic down turn.But again, Ilo debunked the claim, saying, 'We are not owing them at all; we don't owe them a dime. All money due to the pensioners up to December 2011 has been paid, including the upward reviews effected by the government. We do not determine how much a pensioner gets, we are not in charge of the reviews, it is only what we get on their behalf from the Budget Office that we can pay to them. If these people have issues they should go to their Board of Trustees.'On the issue of investing money in the stock market, the IGI spokesperson said even if the company did that it would not be of concern to the pensioners since it in no way affected the company's obligations to them. Similarly, a source at the NYSC headquarters, Abuja, who preferred anonymity because he was not authorised to comment on the matter, said it was not true that the pensioners were owed arrears. According to him, 'It is not true that the pensioners are owed up to 20 months of pensions. While I admit that there might be a few problematic cases, most of them are paid regularly.'While reacting to the issue of quarterly payment of pensions, he extricated the PFA, saying, 'This matter is beyond IGI. The Board of Trustees agreed that it should be paid quarterly and that is what IGI is doing. The NYSC has no reason to hold on to retirees' pensions longer than it is necessary and we do not do that. 'Again, let me state that there might be a few cases with problems, that is bound to happen in any complex situation like ours. But instead of condemning the whole process, what should be done is to isolate those cases and let us look at how to redress them,' he said.
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