2 trillion cedis pension cash missing; IMANI threatens court Action

Following the hullabaloo surrounding the management of workers' contributions to Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT), the government enacted the National Pension Act, 2008, Act 766, to create a united pension under a three-tier pension structure.

Under the new law, 13.5% of a worker's contribution would go to SSNIT as the first tier, 5% as second tier would go to Trustees approved by the government, and the third tier which is a voluntary one.

Information pieced together by The Chronicle indicates that whilst the 13.5 % contribution to SSNIT is being properly administered, the operation of the second tier has been decked with suspected corruption.

Besides breaching portions of the Act that set up the fund by the National Pension Regulatory Authority (NPRA), an estimated amount of GHC 208 million (about two trillion old cedis) has also not been accounted for by the mangers of the fund.

The Chronicle gathered that the immediate past acting Chief Executive Officer of the NPRA, Dr. Daniel K. Seddoh, who tried to introduce reform into the operations of the fund by making sure all structures were in place, was frustrated by the Board, compelling him to resign in May, this year.

Section 218 (1) of Act 766, for instance, says that before the licensing of service providers (ie Pension fund Managers), employers would be the ones who shall open a Temporary Occupational Pension Account with the Bank of Ghana, for the purpose of contributing the Compulsory Tier 2 (5%) of their employees.

Regrettably, this provision has been breached, as the NPRA has arrogated to itself the role to open and operate the Temporary Pension Fund (TPF) account with the Bank of Ghana, instead of employers.

The NPRA has also acted as Trustee and Investment advisor for the Temporary Pension Fund.

Section 218 (4) of the same Act also mandates the Board of NPRA to, within 90 days, license Pension Fund Managers, Pension Fund Custodians and Trustees, compute and transfer the accrued contributions and returns in the TPF to Occupational Pension Funds opened by Trustees of employers' choice and registered by NPRA.

Pension Fund managers, Pension Fund Custodians and Trustees have been licensed since March 16 2011, yet this provision in the above section has not been respected.

Section 131 (1) says that Board of NPRA shall consider an application for registration of pension Schemes made by trustees, and take a final decision within 90 days of receipt of such applications.

Obviously, this provision, The Chronicle gathered, has not been respected, as applications for the registration of many schemes have been filed with and received by the NPRA for over six months, without a decision made by the NPRA and communicated to the Trustees.

To rub salt into injury, the money collected so far on behalf of the contributing workers have not been properly accounted for the past three years.

Though the acting Chief Executive of the NPRA, Mr. Sam Pee Yalley, recently told the media that the workers' contributions was intact, and that they should not panic over suspected foul play in the sector, a pressure group, Imani Ghana, thinks otherwise, insisting that, per their calculation, over GHC 208 million of the workers cash has not been accounted for.

Mr. Franklin Cudjoe, founding President of Imani Centre for Policy and Education, told The Chronicle in an interview that a SSNIT audited account they had sighted, which was also published on their website, indicates that the Trust collected GHC 576.8 million in respect of the respect of the 13.5% Tier One contributions for 2010 alone.

Based on this figures from SSNIT, and the fact that 5% of the contribution goes into the second tier, Franklin Cudjoe argues that the amount that should accrue to the second tier fund in 2010 is GHC 213.6 million.