Lest we forget the massive fraud in police pension probe

Most Nigerians were therefore not amused by the pension probe being carried out by the Nigerian Senate, good as the intention may sound. Those who have been following trends in the exercise can best describe it as a circus show. The Minister of Finance, Ngozi Okonja-Iweala confirmed that the Presidential Task Team on Pension Reforms […]

Most Nigerians were therefore not amused by the pension probe being carried out by the Nigerian Senate, good as the intention may sound. Those who have been following trends in the exercise can best describe it as a circus show. The Minister of Finance, Ngozi Okonja-Iweala confirmed that the Presidential Task Team on Pension Reforms had saved the country a whopping N151 billion within the short time it was set up; and this, the minister said formed part of the 2012 Federal Government budget. The head of the task team, Abdulrasheed Maina also told Nigerians that on the invitation of his team to restructure the police pension scheme, his team uncovered mind boggling fraud. Apparently, these discoveries are not being emphasised by the Senate committee. It is only the EFCC that is highlighting this situation.

The appearance and utterances of former Head of the Civil Service of the Federation, Professor Afolabi, was even more comical given the fact that it was his action in the wee days of his tenure, whereby he mandated his cousin to take over the functions of the task team that started the whole controversy. The professor was being economical with the truth when he alleged that the task team consistently flouted his directives. There are allegations that the whole jigsaw started when Afolabi, against presidential directives, attempted to shove aside the task team in order to facilitate certain transactions, which were later voided by the orders of the President through the minister of finance.

Perhaps, what was more appalling were focus on the Presidential Task Team on Pension Reforms spendings.

Given the recent exposé and the attendant clampdown on some members of the pension mafia, we can say the Pension Reform Task Team provided the foundation for the reform. The team whose initial brief was to sanitize the pension schemes of the Head of The Federal Civil Service was drafted into the Police scheme because of the feats it recorded. If this is ignored, some of the persons that constitute the mafia in the pension scam will go unpunished. Revelations by people already in the net indicate that the last may not have been heard about the intrigues and manipulations that characterize the pension probe, as the EFCC may soon begin another round of arrests of suspects.

President Goodluck Jonathan has the best of intentions to sanitize the country’s pension system, put back smiles on the faces of the country’s retired workers, but it is apparent that many of those who claim to be working towards the same goal, are mere pretenders with taller agenda. For him to draft the same team which sanitized the Customs, Immigration and Prisons Pension schemes, and which established a biometric data base for the system, generated authentic data base and eradicated ghost pensioners from the system, lends credence to Mr President’s sincerity of purpose. The later invitations to the Office of the Head of the Federal Civil Service and later the police, with high potentials to go to other places, were intended to ensure uniformity, transparency and accountability in the general pension system.

The Pension Reforms Task Team claimed to have saved the Federal Government billions of naira in terms of stopping the payment of funds to fraudulent and non-existent beneficiaries of pensions and gratuities, exposed age long practices of pension funds ending up in the pockets of members of a guild, whose main pre-occupation had been the diversion of pension funds into private pockets. It is necessary to ensure that whatever steps will be taken, all the discoveries by the team are not swept under the carpet, because there seems to be unnecessary diversion of focus from the fraud in the police pension scheme to the drama during the probe by the House of Representatives. We are tired of watching the macabre dance.

Saleh M. Galadima wrote from Area II, Abuja