Africa-Press – Lesotho. The civil servants are dissatisfied with the pension funds release strategies and have called upon the government to urgently review its agreements with the Fund.
This manifested at the two day deliberation meeting at the Senate where civil servants gathered to decry what they called “lack of transparency in pension funds allocations”.
Presenting the public officers complains on the pension fund at the Senate, civil servants Representative Mpontšeng Pama Letsoela indicated that contribution pension fund was imposed on the public officers’ membership
into the pension fund by the public officers who joined the public services prior to April 2008 and was never optional. She said this means all the affected officers were never given a chance to opt in or opt out hence there is
a need for it to be reviewed and ratified. “When the public officer retires and the lump sum seems to be less than what they ought to have been entitled to under pension’s proclamation Act.
No.4 of 1964, the pension fund tops up only to equate it to that entitlement. This is categorically unfair since the introduction of the fund has penalized the members for their age
while giving non-contributing public officers a better deal of terminal benefits. This price we pay for our terminal benefits warrants that our benefits be above the benefits of those who are not charged a penny for their
terminal benefits. We need the retirement benefits of pension fund members to factor-in the contribution made by the members. If a public officer is entitled
to M750,000.00 under the pensions proclamation where zero contributions are made then under the pension fund we undoubtedly expect a public officer to be entitled to twice that amount (M1,500,000.00),”
Letsoela enlightened. She further stated their protest that upon retirement, the pension fund members are given a lump sum of only a quarter (25%) of the total funds collected into the fund in their names
while three quarters (75%) are kept to buy annuity (disbursable monthly pension to the retiree until death). She stated that they need between 50% and 75% lump
sum as members upon retirement while between 25% and 50% can be used for annuity. “We demand that the government increase its contribution as the employer into our pension fund from 5% to 10% equivalence to our gross
salaries but the employees’ contribution remain at 5%. It is a widely known fact that our government sometimes employs policies that ignore inflationary effects
on our salaries and deny us the annual salary increases. That affects the growth of our fund credits in the pension fund and this intervention will somehow meet the desired growth a quarter way,” she explained.
She also reflected that the death benefit from the specified offices in the pension fund is four-time annual salary while for the members of the public officer pension fund is
one-time annual salary. “We cannot be sweating to serve the nation only to be treated as sub-citizens like it is currently happening hence we demand the same death benefits,” she said.
Letsoela further mentioned that in about 13 years of its existence, the pension fund continues to receive their contributions but hardly produces accurate and regular financial
statements, saying by right they should do that annually. She analyzed that this means that there is never a time the public officers can confidently know and
tell how much they have in their fund credits since the pension fund has decided to make it its own secrets. The Ministry of Finance Principal Secretary (PS) Nthoateng Lebona explained their interventions in
response to the grievances by public officers. She said the government makes policies with good intentions and for the benefit of the recipients, she however
insisted that lessons learnt along the way, saying they are advised that better consultations are important. She said consultations should be well structured
and all-encompassing so that any change is well managed. She said all parties should open clear lines of communication so that every stakeholder has a good
understanding of the pension fund and how it operates. She noted that the pension fund secretariat has been mandated to intensify member education and
awareness. Matching to each of the public officers grievances, here is the summary of what she said; “There is ongoing data correction, verification exercise and because of the magnitude of
this exercise accurate benefits statement may not be issued soon. The Ministry of Public Service is analyzing the best approach to deal with this and shall
report the process to be followed to address this issue. The most fundamental reform in our Public Service Finances is the pension for public servants.
Currently the government operates an unfunded pension scheme that promises a certain pension when one retires. That pension will be paid from the recurrent
budget of that year. ” Lebona enlightened that the reform which the government is introducing is to change the pension scheme from the unfunded to a pre-funded one where the government and employee make annual contributions
that go into a fund that is then invested. She indicated that at retirement, a pensioner will receive a share of that fund plus interest based on his or her years of service and that pension can be left to his spouse or children at death.
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