PENCOM Soars High Despite All Odds

By Elonna AGUH KSM

My previous publications on PenCom titled, the Savvy Story of PENCOM (Part 1-3) looked at the success stories of PenCom and attempted to give insight into her transition and successes since inception.

This article however takes a closer look at some of the strategic moves the commission made in 2022 to ensure it lives up to its mandate.

In the second quarter of 2022, the commission went after defaulters (employers) who failed to remit pension contributions for their employees to their respective Pension Fund Administrators (PFAs). This strategic move saw the recovery of N721.12 million from 20 defaulting employers.

The figure according to PenCom comprises N721.12 million principal contribution and N211.46 million penalty. Of these defaulters, the commission recommended 7 of them for appropriate legal action after all administrative steps taken to make them comply failed.

On the other hand, the commission reported that at the end of the second quarter of 2022, the total pension contributions remitted to individual Retirement Savings Accounts (RSA) stood at N238.75 billion; the public sector accounted for N136.79 billion (57.29%), while the private sector contributed N101.96 billion  (42.71%).

Despite these challenges, PenCom reported “the cumulative pension contributions from inception to the end of the second quarter of 2022 amounted to N8.01 trillion, which is an increase from N7.7 trillion as at the end of Q1 2022”.

In another development, 2,249 deceased workers’ families shared N12.3bn benefits in three months under the Contributory Pension Scheme between April and June 2022.

During the quarter under review, approvals were granted for payment of death benefits amounting to N12,322.69 million to the legal beneficiaries/administrators of 2,249 deceased employees and retirees; 1,678 public (FGN & State) and 571 private sector employees/retirees.  The commission also revealed that a total of N297 billion had been paid into the accounts of 81,229 beneficiaries since it started paying death benefits to relatives of deceased workers.

Another giant stride as captured in data from the National Pension Commission (PenCom) shows that 98,402 Retirement Savings Account (RSA) holders; including 54,897 from the Federal Government, 11,955 from states, and 31,152 from the private sector, are already collecting monthly pensions from life insurance companies.

This is a fallout of the movement of N563.23 billion of pension funds under the Contributory Pension Scheme (CPS) into the nation’s insurance industry as of the end of June 2022. The data also revealed that on a monthly basis, retiree life annuitants receive about N6.62 billion in pensions.

Also recall that in the concluding part of the Savvy Story of PenCom, the commission was seen to have taken another giant stride, by allowing RSA holders to access mortgage facilities. This was followed up with guidelines on accessing RSA balance towards payment of equity contribution for a residential mortgage by RSA holders.

More recently, they have gone a step further by listing the approved Primary Mortgage Lenders across the country that meets the stipulated minimum requirements of the guidelines and other conditions as may be specified by CBN from time to time.

All these developments reflect the doggedness of the Board of Directors and the Management of the National Pension Commission, PenCom in positioning the commission as an institution of repute to address the challenges of pensioners.

The table below shows the list of the approved Primary Mortgage Lenders.

LIST OF PRIMARY MORTGAGE BANKS

***Elonna Aguh, KSM, a public affairs analyst and commentator wrote from Lagos