The Pension Transitional Arrangement Directorate has disclosed that it has paid more than N1tn in monthly pensions to Federal Government retirees under the Defined Benefit Scheme since it took over full pension management in 2015.
The Director of Corporate Services at PTAD, Kabiru Yusuf, made the disclosure on Thursday in Abuja during a one-day training workshop for pension correspondents and online editors. He said the achievement reflects the agency’s commitment to restoring integrity, order, and dignity to the pension system.
According to him, PTAD has “paid a total of about N1.002tn as monthly pension to an average of 212,385 pensioners from the time of DBS takeover in 2015 to October 2025.” He stressed that the guiding principle of the directorate is to ensure fairness through policies such as “one pensioner equals one pension” and “pay the correct pension, to the correct pensioner, at the correct time.”
Yusuf explained that the directorate was established under the Pension Reform Act 2014 to take over the management of Federal Government workers who remained under the old Defined Benefit Scheme after the introduction of the Contributory Pension Scheme.
This means PTAD handles pension administration for retired officers of the Nigeria Police, Customs, Immigration, Correctional Service, civil service retirees, and pensioners of treasury-funded parastatals.
He said the directorate operates under the Federal Ministry of Finance and is regulated by the National Pension Commission (PenCom). It also works with key government offices, including the Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation, Office of the Auditor-General, Budget Office, and National Assembly committees.
Before the creation of PTAD, pension administration faced serious challenges such as ghost pensioners, fraud, weak controls, poor funding, and thousands of unresolved complaints. Yusuf said the situation led to major losses for the government and denied many genuine pensioners and next of kin their rightful benefits for years.
When PTAD began operations, it inherited about 55,000 unresolved pension complaints. These included more than 30,000 eligible pensioners who were not on the payroll and over 10,000 death benefit cases.
Yusuf said PTAD has built its operations on technology and strong governance structures to avoid repeating past mistakes. Some of the innovations include:
- A modern data centre
- A fully digitised and integrated pensioners’ database
- Mobile verification for elderly or sick pensioners
- Automated computation tools
- A payroll management system for accurate monthly payments
- A complaints portal and call centre to assist pensioners
He added that PTAD inherited about N304bn in unfunded pension liabilities but had reduced the figure to about N103.5bn as of September 2025, supported by consistent funding from the government.
Yusuf said PTAD has secured several presidential approvals aimed at improving pensioners’ welfare. These include:
- National Health Insurance Authority coverage for all DBS pensioners
- A harmonisation policy to ensure pensioners are placed on the most recent salary structure
- N45bn emergency funding for the implementation of the N32,000, 10.66%, and 12.95% pension increases
- Approval for payment of N28.4bn arrears owed to NITEL/MTEL pensioners
- Approval for payment of N39.2bn arrears owed to parastatal pensioners from August 2015 to July 2023
Despite the progress, Yusuf highlighted lingering issues. One of them is the absence of a law making pensions a first-line charge, which would guarantee automatic funding. He also noted the lack of a clear framework for the constitutional requirement that pensions be reviewed every five years.
He added that the transfer of ex-workers of 14 defunct or privatised agencies to PTAD has expanded its responsibilities and affected earlier expectations that the DBS population would shrink over time.
Earlier, the Executive Secretary of PTAD, Tolulope Odunaiya, represented by Yusuf, said the workshop was organised to help journalists understand the directorate’s mandate, reforms, and future plans. She thanked the media for its support and accurate reporting, noting that correct information is vital to protecting pensioners’ welfare and ensuring transparency in the system.
Odunaiya said PTAD will continue to strengthen its pension administration processes with fairness, legality, and compassion as guiding principles.
