The Kaduna State Government has released the sum of N1.6 billion for the payment of pensions, gratuities and death benefits to retired civil servants.
This was disclosed in a statement issued on Saturday by the Executive Secretary of the State Pension Bureau, Salamatu Isa.
She explained that the bureau has commenced physical verification of pensioners, which she notes is necessary to ensure that only genuine pensioners are paid.
According to Isa, the move is to ensure that pensioners supplied complete information, including correct account numbers and Bank Verification Number.
“We commenced payment of gratuities and death benefits on the 15th of September 2020 for batch 10. The state government released the sum of 1.6 billion naira, and we will pay pensioners from the State and 23 Local Governments that have been scheduled in the batch that is ready for payment.
“We want pensioners and next of kin of those who died to come over for physical verification. We also want to use exercise to collect complete information from the beneficiaries because some of them did not give complete information to the Bureau when they retired,” she said.
While noting that the bureau is currently paying the 10th batch of retired civil servants who have undergone verification, she lamented that there are people in batch 1-9 whose banks were unable to pay because they supplied incorrect account numbers and BVN.
She said that the bureau will ensure that all necessary information is supplied before names are forwarded to the banks to prevent a situation whereby pensioners have issues with their banks.
The Executive Secretary of the Pension Bureau asked civil servants who have retired from the state to come to the bureau with all relevant documents and information required.
She revealed that current administration inherited huge backlog of unpaid retirement and death benefits running into several billions of naira which previous governments failed to clear, saying it is impossible for any government to clear such amount in one swoop.
She commended the current administration for regular release of funds to clear the liabilities in batches.
