By Aminu Safana
BEFORE the advent of the 2004 pension Act, pension
administration in Nigeria was bedeviled with all sorts of
challenges ranging from inadequate funding and misappropriation of
pension funds to delays in payment of benefits, lack of authentic
records/data of pensioners, existence of ghost pensioners etc. This
has been a thing of the past in the judiciary as a lot has been
accomplished since the taking over of this responsibility by the
National Judicial Council.
Pension rights of federal judicial officers
In 2007, the responsibility of the administration of Pensions of
Federal Judicial Officers was transferred to the National Judicial
Council viz; the Pension Rights of Federal Judicial Officers
(Administration of Pension) Act 2007. Since then, the National
Judicial Council has been paying the Pensions of the retired
Federal Judicial Officers from its Annual Budgetary Ceiling.
Upward review of pension of federal judicial
officers
In 2016, the National Judicial Council, through the Office of
the National Salaries, Incomes and Wages Commission reviewed
upward, the Pension of the retired Federal Judicial Officers with
retrospective effect from February, 2012, and paid arrears to the
affected retired Judicial Officers. The review was in line with the
provisions of Section 173 (3) of the 1999 Constitution of the
Federal Republic of Nigeria, as amended. This exercise will be a
continuous one.
Payment of pensions
Payment of pension (Monthly) has always been a priority to the
Council and as such all payment processes gets completed not later
than 25th of every month. It is also a point to note that Judicial
Officers that retire from service gets their gratuity latest two
weeks from the date of the submission of request for payment
provided that all the required support documents are made available
and verified.
Contributory pension scheme
With the advent of the Contributory Pension Scheme in 2004, the
contribution of employer and employee were both handled by the
National Pension Commission. They made remittances into the
Retirement Savings Accounts of the employees of the Federal
Judiciary under the Contributory Pension Scheme on the basis of 7.5
per cent for the employee and 7.5 per cent for the employer,
bringing the total contribution to 15 per cent for a month.
In 2012, the National Pension Commission (PenCom) transferred
impromptly the responsibility for payment of Accrued Pension Rights
of the Federal Judiciary Staff to the National Judicial Council.
This development prompted the Council to commence the payment from
the budgetary ceiling of the Federal Judiciary, after the actuarial
valuation of the Liabilities of the Federal Judiciary Staff.
Information technology
In 2018, the council created a data base center for the pension
department to ensure custody of the bio-metric data of all retired
judicial officers and staff of the federal judiciary. The council
also deploys an Easy-Pay Module to facilitate an electronic payment
in the department, such as; e-Voucher, e-Vote Book, e-Expenditure
Control, e-Checking and e-Mandate. This has tremendously brought
progress, accuracy and speed with which payments are done in the
Pension Department.
Verification / enrolment exercises
It is a tradition that annually, pension department embark on
verification of all pensioners who are currently captured in the
payroll of the council with the aim ascertaining the genuineness of
their true existence so as to curb the menace of making payments to
the non-existing pensioners. This is usually done periodically by
taking the exercise to the door steps of all the retirees across
the 36 states of the Federation including FCT, Abuja.
To further simplify the exercise, the use of Information
Technology has been deployed in recent time.
Training and development
Training of staff: – Pension industry has always been a dynamic
industry with changes and challenges coming up by day. This affirm
the fact that the industry is still evolving and that makes it
necessary for the Council to always consider keeping its staff
abreast with the trend and developments in the industry through
special and tailored programs by well-informed professional bodies
such as the ASCON, ITF, CMD etc.
In addition, the department has made series of commitment in
conducting training programs annually for its staff in
collaboration with National Pension Commission as well as having
interactive sessions with Pension Desk officers of all Courts and
Judicial Bodies.
The pre-retirement training: The Council is very much informed
and in tune with its responsibility of preparing its staff for
retirement and as such a lot of efforts and resources have always
been channeled toward accomplishing this task. This has helped
tremendously in preparing the staff for a life after service. The
program is usually a three-day program that entails lecture series,
visitation to farms / SMEs and also interface with the
participants’ spouses so as to tune them to empathizing with their
partners upon retirement.
CHALLENGES:
The successes recorded in the administration of pensions in the
Federal Judiciary must not have been achieved without some
challenges. Some of the challenges are highlighted as follows:
Non-provision of special funds by the budget Office of the
Federation outside the budget ceiling of the Federal Judiciary for
payment of Pensions to retired Judicial Officers.
Duplication of Retirement Savings Account Number (RSA) by some
employees, thereby, causing hindrance on accurate remittance of
monthly contributions.
Late submission of required documents for the process of
retirement benefits.
Lack of financial support by PenCom to carter for the liability
of paying the Accrued Pension Right of Federal Judiciary Staff upon
the taking over of such responsibility from PenCom.
Aminu Safana is Assistant Director, Pension, National Judicial
Council
Culled from Nigerian Tribune