Disturbed by frustration some retirees pass through on retirement, the Chartered Institute of Personnel Management of Nigeria (CIPM), Akwa Ibom State chapter, recently held a policy dialogue lecture on how to retire from active service to a fulfilled, stable, happy and prolonged healthy life of pleasure.
The lecture, 6th in the series with the topic:  “Effective Management of Post-exit Stability and Mortality”, was presented by Elder Okopide U Akpan, an associate member of the institute and head of administration of Onna Local Government Area, Akwa Ibom State.
In the lecture, the speaker opined that planning for retirement must start from the first day one joins the service and listed opening of a dedicated account with a reputable bank paying in just five per cent of monthly income avoiding wasteful spending and investing in shares as some of the plans that would guarantee blissful retirement.  Others include avoidance of over expenditure on less relevant things and ostentatious life style.
The keynote address speaker also advised civil servants to be disciplined in their spending so that they do not run the risk of running out of fund at any point in time.
In his opening remarks, the chairman of the session, Ekanabasi Ubong agreed with the keynote speaker that the ideal period to plan for retirement is the very day one starts working. Ubong, a retired permanent secretary admitted that he did not know when he started work because nobody told him.
He thanked the institute for the policy dialogue initiative lecture believing that it would help a lot of people to plan for their exit.
He advised that the communique’ issued at the end of the lecture be given the widest publicity and made available to the chief executive officer of the state through the office of the head of service for dissemination to civil servants to encourage them to plan for their retirement in time.
Welcoming the participants to the lecture, the branch Chairman, Hogan Bassey, expressed displeasure over the lackadaisical attitude and poor attendance by members at the event and called for change of attitude towards the institute’s activities by members.
The institute set up three-man communiqué committee, which include the immediate past branch chairman, Iniabasi Ubong to serve as chairman, Francis B. Etim, Sunday Edeke, to serve as secretary and they were asked to begin work immediately.
High point of the day was the presentation of awards to the lecture presenter and chairman of the occasion.

Akaiso Akaiso Snr, Uyo