The management of military pension in Nigeria like everything else is fraud-laden, error-prone, bedevilled by meaningless bureaucratic bottlenecks and characterised by reckless and senseless indolence on the part of serving military officers in handling the affairs of their retired seniors and in cahoot with some civilians.
As you will see later in this material, several scams are perpetrated in the management of military pension and the legitimate earnings of retired soldiers are sabotaged, denying them of their legal rights to survival entrenched in our laws. In fact, on way too many occassions, the provisions of the law in this regard have often been abused, flouted and disregarded by those in charge of the welfare of veterans. The scam is perpetrated by an arrogant inter-ministerial syndicate consisting of civilians and serving military personnel and some banks who do the biddings of compromised agents.
The business rules are often hazy and not clearly defined leaving so much to individual discretion and even where they are defined, they are hidden from military pensioners who are deliberately kept in the dark about their entitlements, government policies and directives as they relate to pension issues.
It is pertinent at this stage to delve into contents of some documents and statistics that show brazen dishonesty on the part of government officials and the outright connivance of members of the National Assembly of Nigeria to perpetuate a regime of consistent fleecing of military pensioners without the slightest feeling of compunction.
I have perused several official correspondences between government agencies and some military pensioners and I could only come off disappointed at the level of wickedness and slothfulness exhibited by government officials.
In 1999, for example, it was a thing of excitement for military pensioners that a guideline for the review of pension rates was released. But, nothing in the document was put to effect until the year 2000. Subsequent reviews since that year were dubiously implemented by officials of the Federal Ministry of Finance, the Military Pension Board operated wrongfully under the Office of the Chief of Defence Staff and the Ministry of Defence. The parameters have been manipulated by way of deliberate ommissions and unlawful deductions in contravention of the law and in outright disregard for presidential directives, consequently robbing the pensioners of income.
The aggregate of illicit ommissions and deductions has since grown and become unmanageable leading to prodigious arrears and that is apart from unpaid dues declared.
Some military pensioners did make representations to the relevant authorities severally with a view to having the issues addressed but they were either rebuffed outrightly or stylishly. In fact, on many occassions, government officials shied away from meeting with them to address issues which they knew were true and that the military pensioners had valid claims.
In 2003, the Harmonised Armed Forces Salary Structure (HAFFSS) 2003, came into effect on October 1. Expectedly, a pension rate review should have followed but none came until Augest 5, 2010. What is even more painful is that the computation of gratuity and pension dues were characterized by ommissions which have not been remedied to this day. For all military pensioners who had retired between October 1, 2003 and December 31, 2006, gratuity was unlawfully computed based on HAFSS 2000 monetized allowances and not the HAFSS 2003 monetized allowances which should be the correct parameters as they had taken legal effect as at the time of their retirement.
Another ready example has to do with the fraudulent manipulation of effective accomodation allowance at the time to deny military pensioners of part of their earnings. In a secular released on February 12, 2004 by the Presidency through the National Salaries, Incomes and Wages Commission with Reference No: SWC/04/S.167/216 titled 'APPROVED RATES FOR MONETISATION OF FRINGE BENEFITS IN THE FEDERAL PUBLIC SERVICE WITH EFFECT FROM 1ST OCTOBER, 2003', accommodation allowance was monetized at the rate of 50% of ANNUAL BASIC SALARY for HAFSS 01 - 06. It was 60% for those on HAFSS 07 - 14 and 75% for HAFSS 15 - 17. It is shocking that instead of using the approved rates which had become legal, a flat rate of 40% was used for all military pensioners until the item was removed BY OMMISSIONS IN COMPUTATION WITHOUT A NEW DIRECTIVE. It is only Transport Allowance that was reviewed upwards by 4% which came into effect in 2007 as evidenced by the circular released by The Presidency through the National Salaries, Incomes and Wages Commission on October 9, 2007, titled, "REVIEW OF TRANSPORT ALLOWANCE IN THE FEDERAL PUBLIC SERVICE" with Reference No. SWC.04/Vol. VI/292.
In addition, under HAFSS 2003, monetized UTILITY ALLOWANCE was 15% of Annual Basic Salary for those on HAFSS 01 - 16 and 20% for those on HAFSS 17. It should be noted, however, that not one military pensioner was given a dime of this approved money yet monies were appropriated for it.
There was also an approved 4% increment in TRANSPORT ALLOWANCE from 25% to 29%, a kind of adjustment for inflation to douse the impact of the increment in the prices of petroleum products at the time, particularly in 2005. The increment became effective from July, 2006 but nothing was paid of it until January 1, 2007 when the Consolidated Armed Forces Salary Structure (CONAFSS) 2007 became effective. That notwithstanding, the increment with effect from July 1, 2006 - December 31, 2006 was approved by the Presidency through the National Salaries, Incomes and Wages Commission for immediate disbursement to the beneficiaries. Guess what? The military pensioners were left out in the cold and not even those who became pensioners after who had been legal beneficiaries while serving at the time but who were retired before the time of payment in 2007 were given a dime.
When in 2007, CONAFSS had come into effect, accommodation and furrniture allowances were removed from the list of benefits. The excuse? Military men stay in furnished accomodation in barracks. However, they abandoned the interest of military pensioners who do not stay in the barracks. Consequently, military pensioners have since then been deliberately denied of income to the tune of 50% to 75% of Annual Basic Salary as earlier stated and another 40% per annum of Annual Basic Salary for 5 years running for Furniture Allowance. Meanwhile, the civil servants were paid theirs. In this regard, the arrears were carried over into the 2008 pension review and subsequently into the 2010 review. The implication? The 53.37% salary review for 2010 was flawed with erroneous data for computing the benefits of military pensioners and despite the flaws in ommission of relevant allowances admitted eventually by government officials, government approved a paltry 15% increment for pension out of an average salary increase of 99.5% engendered in the 2007 salary review and only 6% of an average of 29.123% of salary increase in 2003 was approved for pensioners. This was clearly irresponsible and an outright disregard for the welfare of military pensioners.
There are also other forms of unlawful deductions meted out to retired military personnel in the computation of their entitlements including those for car loans and other sundry items. I know of officers who were deliberately shortchanged and huge sums from their entitlements were stolen through such deductions with no clearcut remedies in place to address the issues arising. A senior officer who had retired had over N800,000.00 deducted unlawfully from his benefits for a car loan he had since paid while in service and for years nothing has been done to refund that money to him.
How on earth does government expect these men and women to survive after putting their lives at risk for the nation and her citizens for upwards of 10 years and some as much as 30 years or more?
What makes the attitude of government officials suspicious and even so much more irksome is the fact that several attempts to meet with them to iron out the issues have often been treated with levity.
From my research, these men and women who ought to be enjoying their retirement are forced to take to the streets to get the attention of government officials and even at that, they are only given empty promises by various administrations that fail to fulfill them and the loving parents and responsible citizens that they are, they often sheathe their swords and return home to feed on hope and despondence and palpable lack.
A little insight into and reminder of lawful and peaceful efforts by these men and women to resolve these issues with government will help you understand their plight and the dubiety of the part of government officials in various MDAs. Most of these events were published in the dailies if you followed the news.
On July 10, 2013, the first public protest was embarked upon after many years of abuse and being shortchanged by managers of military pensions in Nigeria. Successive Chiefs of Defence Staff under whose office the Military Pension Board operates ill-advisedly have done absolutely nothing to address the issues. When we place this against the background of the various underhand dealings under Badeh, the immediate past Chief of Defence Staff, there might be need to look deeply into what criminal factors must have come into play. Hoepfully, the present man will rise to the occassion.
As at August 2013, 33% of 53.37% owed military pensioners was outstanding and has not been pad to them until this day.
On December 12, 2013, the Ex-Service Men Welfare Asociation wrote to the President, the National Assembly and other stakeholders when they were told that money meant to pay their pension benefits was criminally ommitted from the 2014 Appropriation Bill.
On January 15, 2014, a reminder was sent to the stakehoders in relation to the letter that had been sent to them on Decemvber 12, 2013 during a mild protest embarked upon by military pensioners at the Eagle Square as the previous letter had actually been disregarded and they failed to reply the letter.
On January 28, 2014, the remider letter was replied to by the Senate claiming they were looking into the issues.
February 5, 2014, both the House of Representatives and Senate Committees on Defence were written requesting to meet with them.
The House of Representatives Committee on Defence replied scheduling a meeting for February 12, 2014 and the meeting did hold where the military pensioners aired their grievances to the authorities for the very first time after so many rebuffed efforts.
By June 25, 2014 when nothing had been done by the authorities to address the issues still, the military pensioners embarked on a protest to the National Assembly when non-inclusion of money to pay their arrears became known to them and both representatives of the House of Representatives and the Senate addressed them and a joint meeting was slated for July 3, 2014 at the National Assembly.
A letter was received by the military pensioners from the Senate shelving the slated meeting to July 10, 2014 and by the said date, instead of fulfilling their promise to meet, the senators sent them another letter postponing the meeting indefinitely claiming they were going on a recess.
The military pensioners had no choice but to embark on another round of protest on August 6, 2014, this time to Aso Villa Gate where the erstwhile Minister of Labour met them and addressed them. He had promised to reach them within a week while he took all their protest banners away. He never got back to them neither did he return their banners made with their hard-earned money.
On September 10, 2014, another protest was embarked upon to the Aso Villa Gate where the Minister of State for Defence addressed them. He requested to be given time to consult with the stakeholders concerned to find a way of settling the matter amicably.
Eventually, on September 14, 2014, a letter came in from the Senate having some retired military officers too who cared less about the plight of their colleagues. The Senate had scheduled a meeting with the Committee on Establishment and Public Service slated for September 16, 2014. The meeting did hold and the Minister of Finance who had equally been invited failed to show up and so the meeting was again shelved to September 25, 2014. The veterans presented a letter to the senate committee requesting reimbursement for transportation expenses and accommodation incurred by them due to the continuous rescheduling of the meetings.
By, September 19, a letter confirming the scheduled date of September 25, 2014 for the rescheduled meeting was sent by the senate to the veterans only for them to receive another letter on September 24, 2014 postponing the meeting indefinitely again.
This necessitated another protest as the authorities were obviously dishonest and dodgy about the issues. The protest came up on November 5, 2014. The protest was to the Federal Ministry of Finance. There was a spirited attempt by Lt. Col Nas to divert the protesters to the Aso Villa Gate but he was rebuffed and the protest was a success. A committee was setup by the Honourable Minister of Finance to dialogue to find a way forward but this was not to be as more intrigues were introduced to frustrate the veterans as you will soon see.
The committee met on Novermber 7, 2014 and deliberated on the issues raised. Government representatives acceded to the fact that they were owing the veterans the balance of 20% but the government had no money to pay. Meanwhile, it should be noted that money was being stolen from the state coffers recklessly with the imprimatur of the president, the Minister of Finance and other officers of the administration including the erstwhile National Security Adviser, Col Sambo Dasuki (Rtd). However, another meeting was scheduled for November 19, 2014. The Ex-Service men tabled the issues and the disingenious government officials again requested for another postponement to enable them study the issues they pretended not to be conversant with before responding. Another adjournment was consequently sought for for December 3, 2014.
On December 3, 2014, the meeting could not be said to have held as government representatives who had tried frantically to shelve the meeting again albeit unsuccessfully, failed to turn up whereas they were in their offices in the very same building at the time the meeting was scheduled to hold. However, the Deputy Director (Budget) who knew absolutely nothing about the details of the previous meetings was sent to stand in for the government. He had no clue about the issues neither did he come along with the documents the government representatives had promised to furnish the veterans with. It turned out that government was insincere and had a lot to hide and that the fraud was deliberate and orchestrated by agents across the ministries, departments and agencies of government that were relevant to the issues at stake.
Inevitably, a massive protest was planned to disrupt the Armed Forces Rememberance Day Celebrations on January 15, 2015 to draw the attention of citizens and the world to the plight of the veterans who are robbed by their countrymen whom they had fought, wrought and toiled tirelessly for for several years yet they are denied of their lawful entitlements. It was abhorable, disdainful, painful, shameful and indeed disgraceful that such ill-treatment was being meted out to them. The aim of disrupting the celebrations was to show the government it was preposterous and hypocritical of them to celebrate dead heroes while the living heroes were left to wallow in want and penury.
Consequently, government called for an emergency meeting at the Federal Ministry of Finance. Government officials had promised that the arrears would be paid over a period of 3 years on a quarterly basis. The veterans insisted they would only accede to that if a detailed presentation of infractions from the law, miscalculations, deliberate ommissions and errors of commission in the computation were made to the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Defence. This was with a view to enabling government arrive at a more appropriate decision taking into consideration all the indices for fairness and equity in computing the arrears correctly. January 16, 2015 was picked as the date for the presentation. The presentation did hold. After the presentation, the Permanent Secretary setup a committee on Military Pension whose members were drawn from the Military Pensioners' Associations, the Ministry of Defence, the Military Pension Board and the Nigerian Legion and chaired by the Director, Joint Services Department of the Ministry of Defence.
The only meeting of the so-called standing committee was held on February 18, 2015 at the Office of the Director, Joint Services Department only to discover that the meeting had no legal backing as there was no convening order as required by law in setting up the committee and the committee had no terms of reference to work with. It dawned on the veterans that they were only being taken for a ride and that there was so much more than meets the eye in the fraudulent manipulation of the issues bordering on welfare and entitlements of military pensioners.
Having waited for two clear months since the sham meeting at the Ministry of Defence, the veterans staged another protest to the Ministry of Defence on March 17, 2015.
By March 30, they received a letter requesting that veterans showed evidence of registration before the issues could be addressed.
In the end, the last adminstration impugned its integrity and soiled itself with dishonesty in such brazen manner unbecoming of government officials worth their salt. They left the issues unresolved and consequently shifted responsibility and the burden of their criminality and dubiety to the present administration.
It is hoped that the present administration will act in the nick of time to save the situation from escalating into civil disobedience occassioned by years of disdainful treatment with ignominy of veterans asking for nothing more than their just dues.
The next article shall focus on the way forward out of this mess.
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