Retired police officers in Kwara State staged a peaceful protest on Monday, calling for their immediate removal from the Contributory Pension Scheme (CPS).

The protesters were seen with placards bearing inscriptions such as “President, NASS and IGP should honourably exempt the police from the CPS; Establish Police Pension Board to manage gratuity and pensions; Mr. President: Improve Police Welfare for effective service delivery, If CPS is so good, why did AIGs, DIGs and IGPs exempt themselves from the scheme?” They sought the establishment of a board that would oversee the pension matters of the police as applicable in other security agencies.

The retired policemen, under the aegis of the Association of Retired Police Officers of Nigeria (ARPON), alleged that the scheme has been fraught with challenges since its inception.

They wanted retired officers in the pension category to be exempt, similar to those who rose to the position of General in the force.

Addressing the protesters during the peaceful demonstration in Ilorin, chairman of the group, Yakubu Jimoh, a retired Chief Superintendent of Police, pleaded with President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to urgently rescue the situation.

Jimoh, who urged that retired police officers be removed from the contributory pension scheme, added that a force pension board should be established to manage the pensions of the officers.

According to him, the report of the Senate Committee on Establishment and Public Services on the bill for the establishment of the Police Pension Board, which was held in a public hearing in November last year, should be released, notwithstanding that it was conducted eight months ago.

He also called on the federal government and the National Assembly to fast-track the legislative process for the disbursement of the N758 billion, a pension shortfall owed to security agencies. He noted that retired officers were informed that payment was scheduled for June 2025, but expressed concern about the delay in the disbursement.

He appealed to the National Assembly to expedite action on the payment, so as to alleviate the suffering of the retirees and enhance the retirement welfare of both serving and retired officers.

In the letter of agitation given to newsmen, he said: “Our exit being advocated should be outright removal from the scheme. Since the inception of the contributory pension scheme, it has been one problem or another. It is unfortunate that officials of the National Pension Commission/Pension Fund Administrators (PFAs), who came to deliver a lecture on the workings of the scheme, do not reveal their bitter experiences in the hands of their host to their masters when they get back.

“We have always resented this contributory pension scheme, which provides gratuity and a monthly pension, as it is just a pittance and not a living wage. We are all witnesses to the lamentations of the retired police officers on social media. Imagine a Superintendent of Police being paid N2.4million as his gratuity after 35 years of meritorious service and a paltry N30,000 as a monthly pension.

“This, to say the least, is responsible for corruption in the Police Force, as the officers want to make it by all means. From the Commissioners of Police down the ladder are lamentations of woe. Only the Police ‘Generalismos’, retired Inspector Generals, Deputy Inspector Generals and Assistant Inspector Generals recently exited the scheme while this agitation was on. They are getting fat pension benefits as the case may be.

“Back to memory lane, when the Military was to exit this scheme, their senior officers did not discriminate. They pulled out all the other ranks. In the case of police, IGP Egbetokun was asking a Police lecture parade of Senior Officers and men in Kwara State that, ‘where are you exiting to?’ Because of the regimentality of the job, the audience kept mute and watched in ‘admiration’ of the Speaker/IGP.

“The answer from retirees since then has been that we want to exit to where the police generals had gone. Those agencies that exited the scheme, such as the Military and DSS, take more pension compared to their counterparts of the same rank in the police.”

The Legal Adviser of ARPON, Adekunle Iwalaiye, stated that the retired officers deserve to receive a living pension, rather than the crumbs they currently receive monthly.

Iwalaiye, a retired Superintendent of Police, tasked the government to act on the demand of the retirees, considering the meritorious services they rendered to the country for 35 years.

“We are here to get across to the press so that our voices can be heard in respect of the pains retired police officers have been passing through under the current pension scheme. What we are saying is that retired police officers are human beings too; we deserve a living wage, and we are Nigerians with flesh and blood flowing in our veins.

“The set of people you are seeing here are Nigerians who have used 35 years of our youthful age to serve this country in various capacities. Some of us carried bullet wounds and various degrees of wounds suffered in the cause of our service to this nation,” he stressed.