Trustfund Pensions, a leading Pension Fund Administrator (PFA), has stressed the importance of employers’ compliance with relevant provisions of the Pension Act 2014 (as amended) to sustain
the growth of the Contributory Pension Scheme (CPS).
The company believes both the employers and employees take active interest in the scheme, which, according to Obiora Ozoekwem, Lagos regional manager of Trustfund Pensions, is critical to the future of employees.
Ozoekwem spoke with BusinessDay during the company’s employers’ forum in Lagos. According to Ozoekwem, who put the customer base of Trustfund as at December 2018 at over 718,000,
observation over time shows that some employers and employees do not give the deserved attention despite being a major leap from the old unfunded pension scheme.
“The onus lies on an employee upon securing a job to choose a PFA of his or her choice. The employer has a role to ensure that the employee pick one PFA.
It is also expected of the employees to have their National Identity Number (NIN). That is the new rule, so we encourage workers to register with the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC) and submit their NIN to their PFA because without it, they can’t access
their pension funds. If anybody retires today, PFA won’t be able to process his or her retirement benefit unless NIN is submitted to the PFA,” said Ozoekwem.
Still on employer/ employee obligation under the Pension Reform Act, Christopher Fakanlu, head of compliance unit of Trustfund, with reference to Section 11 (1), said it was mandatory for the employee and employer to contribute 8% and 10% (totaling 18%) respectively of the employee’s monthly emolument to the employee’s Retirement Saving Account (RSA), failure of which attracts severe sanctions from the industry regulator.
