FG approves group life insurance for civil servants, govt officials

The Federal Executive Council (FEC) has sanctioned the implementation of a group life insurance policy designed to provide coverage for top-ranking government officials, civil servants, and personnel in select federal agencies.

The decision was reached during the weekly FEC meeting held at the State House in Abuja, chaired by President Bola Tinubu.

Briefing journalists after the meeting, the Head of the Civil Service of the Federation, Didi Walson-Jack, explained that the policy would benefit a broad spectrum of federal employees, including the President, Vice President, ministers, permanent secretaries, and workers in ministries and agencies funded by the national treasury.

She noted that the insurance coverage also extends to personnel of several paramilitary organizations such as the Nigeria Immigration Service, the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, the Nigeria Correctional Service, the Federal Fire Service, the Federal Road Safety Corps, the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency, and the Office of the National Security Adviser.

READ ALSO:Civil servants earning under N1m annually to be exempted from tax -Senator

“The scheme underscores the importance that President Bola Tinubu’s Administration has placed [on the] welfare of staff, specifically the welfare of the federal public servant.

“The Group Life Insurance Scheme is a scheme whereby the Federal Government has taken out a life policy on each public servant. And this means that if the unfortunate incident of death occurs, the deceased public servants’ next of kin stands to have a benefit to help the family cushion the family at that time of loss,” Walson-Jack said.

According to her, the policy will run on an annual basis, and the latest approval is for the 2025/2026 coverage year. This cycle begins once premiums are paid to insurance firms, in line with the government’s “no premium, no cover” policy.

She further clarified that the coverage will remain valid for 12 months and will lapse at the end of 2026.

“The approval for today was for the appointment of 17 insurance underwriters for the group life insurance cover and the year 2025/2026. The premium is paid to the insurance companies for a duration of 12 months.

“So, this policy will expire next year. I just like to say that in as much as this policy has existed throughout this administration and even previous administrations, we find that not too many people know about the policy, and so we have, from my office, even planned to carry out a sensitisation, which will be coming up very soon,” she added.