{"id":57685,"date":"2024-12-05T09:03:15","date_gmt":"2024-12-05T09:03:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/?p=57685"},"modified":"2024-12-05T09:03:15","modified_gmt":"2024-12-05T09:03:15","slug":"retired-soldiers-protest-over-unpaid-benefits-in-abuja","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/2024\/12\/05\/retired-soldiers-protest-over-unpaid-benefits-in-abuja\/","title":{"rendered":"Retired Soldiers Protest Over Unpaid Benefits in Abuja"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By Jesusemen Oratokhai<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Abuja witnessed a peaceful protest on Thursday as retired military personnel gathered at the Federal Ministry of Finance, demanding payment of their long-overdue entitlements.<\/p>\n<p>The protesters, carrying mats, chairs, and canopies, accused the government of failing to honor commitments made to them, resulting in severe financial hardship.<\/p>\n<p>Key grievances include unpaid salary increments of 20% to 28% for January to November 2024, palliative payments promised since October 2023, and a \u20a632,000 adjustment to their pensions.<\/p>\n<p>Additionally, the retirees are demanding the bulk payment of the Security Debarment Allowance and refunds of deductions made from the pensions of medically discharged soldiers.<\/p>\n<p>Colonel Innocent Azubuike (retd.), a leader of the protest, expressed frustration over repeated delays.<\/p>\n<p>He revealed that while the government assured them in November that their entitlements were approved, the payments remain stalled due to a lack of cash backing.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe were told everything was ready, but the funds have not been released. The Ministry of Defence has done its part; now the issue lies squarely with the Ministry of Finance,\u201d Azubuike said.<\/p>\n<p>The retirees highlighted the dire consequences of the payment delays, noting that many of their members are struggling to survive.<\/p>\n<p>They vowed to remain at the ministry until their demands are met, insisting that their service to the nation deserves better recognition and prompt action.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Jesusemen Oratokhai &nbsp; Abuja witnessed a peaceful protest on Thursday as retired military personnel gathered at the Federal Ministry of Finance, demanding payment of their long-overdue entitlements. The protesters, carrying mats, chairs, and canopies, accused the government of failing to honor commitments made to them, resulting in severe financial hardship. Key grievances include unpaid [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":57686,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[177,172],"tags":[59],"class_list":["post-57685","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-abuja-reports","category-news","tag-featured"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57685","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57685"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57685\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":57687,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57685\/revisions\/57687"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/57686"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57685"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57685"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/abujacityjournal.com\/livenews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57685"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}