Ahmed Abubakar, Dutse
In many states, the condition of pensioners is pathetic. Oftentimes, their allowances are unpaid for months, resulting in enormous financial crisis to them. They cannot feed properly or fend for their families. In worse case situations, some of them die in the course of long wait for their benefits and dues.
But the story is different for pensioners in Jigawa State; they are actually smiling all the way to the bank. In the state, pensioners are strong and not frail and many among them have successfully begun a new of life in other fields of human endeavour.
A 65-year-old Buba Hassan Hadejia retired from the service five years ago. He told Daily Sun: “I was paid in full and honestly I used my money to buy a house and the rest, I used to start up a petty venture in from my house.”
He said every month he receives his pension alert and does not have to travel all the way from Hadejia to Dutse to get paid, as was the case in some other states.
A retired staff of the General Hospital, Dutse, Mallama Asabe Liman, said she retired as a health worker after serving for 35 years after joining the state civil service right before the creation of the state from the old Kano State:
“Apart from the better condition of service, we the workers were treated like kings and queens, especially by the previous administration of Alhaji Sule Lamido.” Upon her retirement, she got all her benefits without any delay or any form of inducement to the officers that facilitated the payment.
Jigawa State Pension Scheme Module was initiated to take care of peculiar problems to ensure effective implementation of pension service to these retirees. Executive Secretary, Local Government and State Contributory Pension Scheme, Hashimu Ahmed Fagham, said the state has paid N7,684,173,536.04 to 2,060 beneficiaries from January to December, 2019.
The beneficiaries cut across the retirees from the state, local government and local government education authority. He added that N534,029,139.19 was paid to 318 retirees:
“The state beneficiaries of 96 people were paid N206,164,773.69, 108 local government council beneficiaries received N130,976,058.37 while 114 Local government education authourity beneficiaries got N196,888,307.13 respectively.”