RETIRING HOME: NIGERIANS, OTHERS LOSE PENSION TO UK GOVERNMENT

The days of receiving full pension payment by migrants from Nigeria and other parts of Africa from the United Kingdom government is over, according to a new policy on pension for ‘citizens’ who retire abroad.
The policy, which is already being contested by those affected, tends to exclude those who originally migrated to the United Kingdom, worked and now decide to retire to their original countries of origin from receiving full pension.
Reports monitored in Retirement Links says half of the 1.2 million UK pensioners who have moved abroad have had their pensions frozen, meaning their monthly payments have remained at the amount they received at state retirement age – with no annual increase in line with inflation.
In other words, a 90-year-old who migrated at pension age gets just £43.60 per week, while a newly-retired pensioner is entitled to £113.10 under the current policy. Statistics suggest 95 per cent of those with frozen pensions live in Commonwealth countries.
The 2001 UK Census recorded 88,378 Nigerian-born people resident in the UK. More recent estimates by the Office for National Statistics put the figure 32at 174,000 in 2011. Community leaders believe the growing population is over 500,000 in 2012.
A Council of Europe report gives a figure of 100,000 Nigerians in the UK but suggests that this is likely to be an underestimate since it does not include irregular migrants or children born outside of Nigeria. Worried by the development, the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) is calling for concerted action from Commonwealth heads of state to combat the ‘unfair’ policy on pensions for those who retire abroad.
This policy, however, does not affect those who move to European Union countries, the United States, Israel, Mauritius and the Philippines, as they have been exempted and will continue to get the increases which are applied to UK-based pensioners. It also does not affect those who migrate to Barbados, Bermuda and Jamaica in the Caribbean because of a special arrangement.
The International Consortium of British Pensioners (ICBP), who is leading the campaign for change, has branded the policy “absurd.”
The group has rejected the Government’s argument that it is unable to pay inflation rate pensions to those who have migrated, pointing out that the treasury actually makes savings of £3,800 per year for every pensioner who leaves Britain, as they do not access services like the NHS. Dave Morris from ICBP said: “It’s absurd that Britain is the only OEDC country (out of 34) that doesn’t uprate their pensions.
Because we don’t live here government thinks nobody cares about the issue. More than half a million people are affected and they all have friends and family here in the UK.”
Pensioner Ellen Lebethe, 76, who is originally from South Africa, said the current system is “simply unfair.” She is urging the high commissions of affected countries to join the campaign against the policy.
She said: “It is wrong that people who have left their countries in their youth and have spent their lives making valuable contributions to this country, having paid their taxes and their national insurance and contributed to pension schemes, are not able to retire back home without being penalised.”
Source: New Telegraph