PenCom Releases N107bn to 313,368 Disengaged Contributors

• PenCom Releases N107bn to 313,368 Disengaged Contributors

The National Pension Commission has paid a total of N107.93bn to 313,468 contributors under the Contributory Pension Scheme that have temporarily lost their jobs.

One of the objectives of the Pension Reform Act of 2014 is to ensure that every person who has worked either in the public service of the federation, Federal Capital Territory, states and local governments or the private sector receives their retirement benefits as and when due.

Through the Pension Reform Act, the commission has been able to establish uniform set of rules, regulations and standards for all aspects of pension administration including payment of retirement benefits to retirees.

Under the scheme, workers in paid employment that lost their jobs and are unable to secure new jobs within a period of three months are entitled to 25 per cent of their contributions.

A further analysis showed that out of the N107.93bn, the private sector accounted for 95.38 per cent of those who benefitted from the payments while the public sector accounted for 4.62 per cent.

The commission said in its first quarter report for the year that approval had also been granted for the payment of N4.51bn to 10,733 Retirement Savings Account holders who were under the age of 50 years, disengaged from work and unable to secure another job within four months of disengagement.

The report read, “Approval was granted for payment of N4.51bn to 10,733 RSA holders who were under the age of 50 years and were disengaged from work and unable to secure another jobs within four months of disengagement.

“The cumulative total number of RSA holders who were paid benefits for temporary loss of job was 313,468 people and they were paid a total of N107.93bn being 25 per cent of the balances of their RSAs as prescribed by the Pension Reform Act 2014.”

The report also said that the commission approved the payment of N4.28bn as death benefits to the beneficiaries of 1,586 deceased employees during the period, adding that this brought the total number of deceased employees from both public and private sectors to 55,820.

It said that the amount paid during the first quarter moved the total payments of death benefits to N173.86bn.