The Nigerian government has cleared a decades-old pension backlog of ₦39bn owed to former employees of defunct state-owned enterprises, officials have confirmed.
The payout settles outstanding pension arrears for former staff of the legacy telecoms firm, Nigerian Telecommunications Limited (NITEL), the Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN), and other retirees under the country’s Defined Benefit Scheme.
In a statement on Friday, the Tinubu Media Volunteers (TMV) praised the resolution as a “historic feat,” noting that some of the debts had been outstanding for more than two decades.
“The non-payment of these pensions had over the years subjected the pensioners to untold hardship,” the group’s chairman, Chukwudi Enekwechi, and secretary, Segun Ogedengbe, said in a joint statement issued via the presidency.
“This backlog had become a source of concern, not only to the pensioners and their immediate families, but also an embarrassment to the country,” the statement added.
Successive administrations had struggled to settle the massive liabilities left behind following the privatization and liquidation of Nigeria’s structural public utilities in the 2000s.
The pressure group maintained that the intervention under President Bola Tinubu’s “Renewed Hope Agenda” aims to restore dignity to public service retirees who spent their productive years serving the nation.
Officials say the intervention will bring immediate relief to thousands of elderly retirees and is part of a broader effort to rebuild public trust in the country’s national pension administration.
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