The Federal Government says it has disbursed ₦5.12 billion in pension arrears to 90,689 retirees under the Defined Benefit Scheme (DBS), even as pensioners from various defunct and existing agencies on Monday took to the streets over unpaid entitlements.
The Pension Transitional Arrangement Directorate (PTAD), in a statement dated August 11 and signed by its Head of Corporate Communications, Olugbenga Ajayi, said the funds were released across the four pension departments in line with the government’s commitment to clearing outstanding pension liabilities.
According to PTAD’s breakdown, 8,626 pensioners in the Customs, Immigration, and Prisons Pension Department received ₦276,032,000; 9,681 in the Police Pension Department got ₦619,584,000; 12,773 retirees in the Civil Service Pension Department were paid ₦408,736,000; and 59,609 retirees in the Parastatals Pension Department received ₦3,814,976,000.
“This reaffirmed our unwavering commitment to pensioners’ welfare under President Bola Tinubu’s Renewed Hope Agenda,” the statement read.
However, the announcement came the same day members of the Nigerian Union of Pensioners from agencies including NITEL, Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria (FRCN), and the Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC) staged a protest over what they described as prolonged neglect.
The aggrieved retirees decried unpaid entitlements running into 35 months, the non-payment of a ₦35,000 palliative, and what they called “the daily hardship of survival without pensions.” They urged the Federal Government to provide a specific timeline for clearing all outstanding payments.
Last week, President Tinubu approved new measures to improve DBS pensioners’ welfare, including a proposed pension harmonisation policy, an extra budgetary allocation for new rates, and health insurance coverage for all retirees under the scheme. These reforms are to be captured in the 2026 budget.
Despite these approvals, the protesting pensioners insisted that immediate action, not promises, is needed to ease their suffering.
