By Joshua Egbodo Abuja
Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon Yakubu Dogara has given the assurance that leadership of the House will meet President Muhammadu Buhari soon, to work out a reliable plan towards off setting the federal government’s pension liabilities, said to be over N200 billion.
Th e Speaker who described the nonpayment of pension as a constitutional breach, also disclosed yesterday that the House would at its plenary this morning ,consider a motion to invite all key players in charge of pension matters to appear in plenary next Th ursday to speak on how they plan to clear the liabilities. Dogara who dropped the hints when he received a delegation from the Nigeria Union of Pensioners, led by its national president, Dr Abel Afolayan, at the National Assembly also stressed that all pensions due to retired public servants must be paid because it is the constitutional rights of the concerned citizens. “I refer us, all of us, to the provision of Section 173, sorry if I sound legalistic, we have to get it right.
Provision of Section 173, subsection 1 of the Constitution provides as follows and I quote, “subject to the provision of this constitution, the right, right, that is the word the Constitution used, the right of a person who works in the public service of the federation to receive pension and gratuity shall be regulated by law. “Obviously, the law, we have passed it, we have done our own part of the bargain which is the Pension Reform Act of 2014 to fulfi ll the provision laid by section 173 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Subsection 2 provides also and I refer to it and quote, that “any benefi t to which a person is entitled in accordance with or under such law as is referred to in subsection 1- and I have said for purpose of subsection 1 is the Pension Reform Act, shall- the framers of the Constitution used the word shall; not be withheld or altered to its disadvantage unless to such extent that it is permissible under any law, including the code of conduct.
“If pension is a right and pensioners must be paid, it means that the federal government is indebted, it is in debt and if it is paid, the government is not doing a favour to anybody, we don’t even deserve any thanks because pension is earned, it is a right”, the Speaker said, noting that President Buhari is also a pensioner, and would also be concerned. Earlier in his remarks, the pensioners’ union leader, Afolayan, appealed to the Speaker and his colleagues in the parliament to use their offi ces to make adequate funds available in the 2017 budget in order to off set the N200 billion pension liabilities owed pensioners across the country, appealing that pension liabilities should be made to enjoy fi rst line charge as a way out of the lingering challenges.
