Extracts from PTAD ES Interview on NTA Business Express on Wednesday 16 Sept 2020

The Executive Secretary of Pension Transitional Arrangement Directorate (PTAD), Dr Chioma Ejikeme was live on NTA Business Express on Wednesday 16 Sept 2020 at 3pm.

Below are extracts from the interview.

The Ministry of Finance, Office of the Accountant General of the Federation have been very good with the release of funds for pensions. This has ensured that we’ve been paying our pensioners promptly and they can attest to that.

We have started validating the results of that verification and right now we are on the verge of removing about 21,227 pensioners off the payroll. These are pensioners who did not come for the verification and they are not supposed to be on the payroll.

We had given the information to the pension unions and I’m here today to also say that there might be some pensioners who are genuine pensioners but for some reason where not able to avail themselves of that verification exercise.

They should reach out to us before the 25th of September so that we can look into their case, verify them and put them on the payroll.

We are also aware that a good number of our pensioners are Diaspora pensioners especially from the Parastatals pension department.

We also seizing this opportunity to say that if you know that your relation worked in any of the Parastatals, the Universities, the Colleges of Education and they are out of the country, please let them know to get in touch with us. We have dedicated an email address for that.

Its papdcomplaints@ptad.gov.ng. Everything is on our website. We are trying to make sure that only genuine credible pensioners are on our database.

PTAD is an engine room for carrying out the mandate of the government concerning pensioners of the Defined Benefit Scheme. When it comes to salary structures and conditions of service, we get instructions from the relevant agencies.

The National Salaries, Incomes & Wages Commission (NSIWC) had set up a committee to look into pension increment and the committee which was chaired by a PTAD Director has concluded and I believe they’ve submitted a report. So we’re just waiting for the recommendation.

We made provision for that increase in our 2020 budget. So we have been funded for that. As soon as we get the instruction, we’ll implement.

With the verification we’re able to weed out people who are not supposed to be there. Going forward, we intend to put in place what we call “I’m Alive” project. The pensioners will keep falling off the database as a result of death.

So we have to have a program in place that will let us know when these pensioners have passed on so that we can remove them from our database. We are looking at proposals right now. This project is in the pipeline.

We continue to create awareness about pension scammers in the Newspapers, electronic media, social media, through the pension unions. We tell our pensioners not to fall for pension fraudsters.

Nobody in PTAD will take money from you to process your pension or to put you on the payroll or to pay you your arrears or gratuity.

We are collaborating with the ICPC and EFCC in this fight. Whenever we get such reports, we always send the complaint to the relevant authority