Pensions: FG assures retired military officers of prompt payment

The Federal Government of Nigeria has assured retired military personnel of the prompt payment of their pensions and entitlements.

The FG’s commitment is part of efforts to boost the morale of officers and men of the military who are still in active service.

The development was revealed on Wednesday by the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Defence, Mr Aliyu Ismaila, at the flag-off of the Military Pensions Verification Exercise in Abuja.

While assessing their well-being, Mr Ismaila noted that the government would continue to take care of all military pensioners and their next-of-kin.

He emphasised that the nationwide verification exercise would enable the FG capture the accurate number of retired military personnel for the purpose of prompt payment of pensions.

Some of the pensioners, L/Cpl. Emmanuel Anaemeje and L/Cpl. Danladi Maiwada, stressed that it had been a long tortuous journey and expressed hopes that the new verification exercise would go unhindered.

Although, the verification exercise ought to be an annual event, the Military Pensions Board has not done any screening for pensioners in the last three years.

The Chairman of the Military Pensions Board, Air Vice Marshal Muhammad Dabo, had earlier promised to commence bio-metric screening of military pensioners across 36 states of the federation to weed out ghost pensioners.

The exercise is being done in 41 centres across the federation and has been structured in such a way that men of similar ranks will do the exercise at the same time.

This, according to him, will not only fast track the exercise, but would also ensure a smooth management of the verification.