The National Pension Commission (PenCom), on Monday disclosed that Nigeria’s pension fund assets had risen to N12.66 trillion even as contributors under the Contributory Pension Scheme (CPS) also rose to the 9.38 million as at June 30 this year.
PenCom’s Director General, PenCom , Mrs. Aisha Dahir-Umar, who gave these figures during the 2021 Journalist Workshop in Lagos, explained that the consistent growth trajectory justified the commission’s overriding investment philosophy of ensuring the safety of pension fund assets.
Represented at the event by the commission’s Head, Corporate Communications, Mr. Peter Aghahowa, the Director General assured pension stakeholders that the commission was fully committed to the successful implementation of the CPS in the country.
Dahir-Umar explained that the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak necessitated a review of business processes across various organisations, which made it imperative for the commission to deepen technology innovation.
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She clarified: “COVID-19 has engendered socio-economic disruptions of the entire global order, with multifarious challenges in conducting hitherto routine activities.
“It was, therefore, imperative for the commission to deepen technological innovation to navigate through the challenges imposed by the pandemic. The most recent technological innovation introduced by the commission is the in-house designed and developed online enrolment application.
“The application has capabilities to register, verify and enroll prospective retirees of Treasury-Funded Federal Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs)”, the DG added.
According to her, by the deployment of the new application, mass gathering of people has been avoided while enhancing convenience for retirees to get them through a seamless enrolment process.
In addition, the DG listed another technological innovation by the commission as the design and deployment of the Retirement Savings Account (RSA) Transfer System (RTS), which was launched in November last year
The pension funds management expert further pointed out that public enlightenment and education was one of the five strategic focus areas currently being pursued by the commission.
“This is considered germane considering that 17 years after the pension reform in Nigeria, there still exists a knowledge gap on the CPS. Consequently, the commission is committed to reinvigorating its public enlightenment and education drive in order to address this challenge,” she said.
Dahir-Umar also spoke on other strategic focus areas of the commission, including the resolution of outstanding pension liabilities of the Federal Government; portfolio diversification of pension fund investments; improvement in customer service delivery across the pension industry and unrelenting pursuit of sustainable growth of the pension industry by expanding the CPS’ coverage.
