While handing down a 2-week ultimatum to the Federal Government to act, Retirees of the Nigeria Police in their hundreds held prayer sessions in Kaduna Thursday, asking God to touch the heart of those in power, especially, the FG, National Assembly, and IGP to look into their plights by removing them from the Compulsory Contributory Pension Scheme introduced by the Obasanjo Administration.
The anguished Retirees said the scheme has brought untold hardship, abject poverty, untimely deaths, while their children could no longer go to school as a result of the meager monthly stipends being paid from their pension “Lump Sum” by the Pension Fund Administrators, PFA who they said, are swimming in wealth.
Addressing journalists after the prayer sessions simultaneously held by both muslims and christians, Spokesman for the retirees, CSP Manir Lawal Zaria (rtd) pleaded with the National Assembly which had started looking into their case to ensure conclusion before the incoming 10th Assembly.
Muslims in prayers.
Christians in theirs‘
He stated that the retirees were also submitting their case to God with the strong belief that with divine intervention, the Almighty would touch the minds of the powers that be, to remove them from the scheme.
CSP Lawal Zaria who narrated plights of the retirees said they have given the Federal Government up to the May 15th 2023 to act and that if nothing was done, they would evacuate their families from homes to the Force Headquarters, Abuja where they could be given a befitting burials should their sufferings result in deaths.
“Some of our colleagues who died in these pathetic situations in their homes, could hardly be buried by their relatives or family members due to the hardships they are passing through.
“While we are dying in hunger and poverty, the fund Administrators who are withholding our fund are swimming in wealth
“Many of us are dying daily which have now become problems to the families who could not afford burial rites of the two main religions, Christianity and Islam, he emphasized.
According to CSP Lawal Zaria, those who retired before the introduction of the Compulsory Contributory Pension Scheme are living better life than them , hence the need for their removal.
