From Owen Akenzua, Asaba
Chairman of Delta State Pension Bureau, Sir Edwin Ogidi-Gbegbaje has expressed dissatisfaction over the inability of Pension Fund Administrators, PFAs, to pay pensioners when due.
Ogidi-Gbegbaje stated this yesterday when he met with all PFAs in Asaba.
He expressed disappointment that some retirees had complained of how they are being treated by PFAs, arising from delay in payments, even after they had been issued their pension certificates, refusal to transfer them to other PFAs and general lack of cooperation from the pension administrators.
He averred that the pension administrators are supposed to ease the tension of pensioners by being friendly and not compound their plight.
“We need to find a way to ease the burden, difficulties and challenges our pensioners are going through and the Bureau expects maximum cooperation from all PFAs to make the work easy and put smiles on the face of Delta State Pensioners,” he said.
According to the chairman, PFAs should find solutions to the recurring issues of Annuity, delay in payments, pin opening etc, noting that Pensioners, after collecting their certificate from the Bureau, it takes another two to more months for the PFAs to release their money, a situation he described as unhealthy for the system.
He said pension administrators should be helpful to retirees considering the fact that they are old, and no longer as strong as before.
The chairman therefore instructed all PFAs in Asaba to communicate with others outside Asaba to make the payment easy for the pensioners and make life easy for them.
He appealed to pension administrators to help contact those the Office could neither reach, nor having any means to communicate them.
Mrs Edith Bratte of FCMB Pension Managers, pleaded with the Bureau over the observed lapses of the PFAs, and promised to serve the retirees better. She added that some of the pensioners could not be reached due to their mobile numbers which are no more in use or out of network coverage.
