Pension funds are under the management of Pension Funds Administrators (PFAs) guided by strict inbuilt safety guards, Director General of the National Pension Commission (PenCom), Omolola Oloworaran, has said.

The Pencom chief stated this when she paid a working visit to the President of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Joe Ajaero, in Abuja.
She hinted that the purpose of the visit was to correct the missteps of the past and to commit to a relationship that is mutually beneficial as well as explore ways the two organisations could work together.

The DG said the board’s oversight function over the organisation (PenCom) could not be wished away. However, she insisted that PenCom is committed to transparency and ready to give information on everything it has done.

She assured that contributors’ funds were safe due to inbuilt safety guards, explaining that funds were not in the custody of PenCom.
President of Congress, Joe Ajaero, in his response, went down memory lane to explain that some of Congress issues with Pencom pre-dated her appointment and revolved around the non-constitution of the board and weighty decisions taken on behalf of the board by unknown entities in violation of the PenCom Act.

He noted that the consequences were equally weighty not just for contributors but the entire philosophy behind the Contributory Pension Scheme, which the government of Olusegun Obasanjo worked hard to put in place to replace the collapsed Defined Benefit Scheme.

He reminded the Pencom boss of how the government ignored complaints from Congress, including a letter that was totally ignored.Ajaero expressed dismay that the DG elected to pick up a fight, pointing out that taking on the Nigeria Labour Congress unjustly could be a costly venture, only because the Congress is on the board, but the funds also belong to workers and not the government.

He pointed out that even when the DG maintained the same course of side-lining the Congress by neither calling nor visiting, Congress took it in its stride.

However, he noted there were certain developments Congress could no longer ignore, hence its second and third letters, which the DG took upon herself to respond to, even when the issues raised were beyond her.He, however, said he was committed to the DG’s rapprochement as there were still serious challenges ahead that their partnership could help tackle.

These challenges, he said include the ambiguous status of gratuity in CPS; short-changing of contributors by PFAs; the agitation of contributors to return to the Defined Benefit Scheme; the non-unionisation of workers in PFAs; non-remittances of contributions by employers/governments; about 60 per cent of workers yet to be captured; and the board must be allowed to perform its statutory functions.