The Executive Secretary of the Pension Transitional Arrangement Directorate (PTAD), Dr. Chioma Ejikeme, has said the agency will remove 21,227 unverified pensioners from the payroll by October.
Speaking to journalists at the PTAD’s 2020 Sensitisation and Capacity Building for anti-graft and other related agencies on the Defined Benefit Scheme (DBS) held in Abuja on Wednesday, Dr Ejikeme said preliminary findings showed that most of the pensioners on the payroll, who did not show up for verification are dead.
The sensitisation was to help on strategies on how PTAD, security agencies and anti-graft agencies could work together to fight pension fraudsters.
The PTAD boss said some pensioners yet to be verified, who are still alive, are either sick or living in the diaspora, and such pensioners would be added to the payroll once they are verified in the future.
“The pension industry has been swamped with complaints of extortion by fraudsters and calls demanding for money in order to quicken computation and payment of outstanding liabilities. These fraudsters take advantage of the desperate and unsuspecting pensioners.”
Dr. Ejikeme said PTAD was partnering with security and anti-corruption agencies to track suspected fraudsters.