Ebere Nwoji
The National Pension Commission (PenCom), in a bid to cover up the gap created by the COVID-19 pandemic in the conduct of its physical enrollment and verification exercise for retiring government workers, has developed a robust online enrollment application system with which it has targeted to capture 21,000 retirees between 2020 and 2021 but were yet to be verified because of the pandemic.
The commission, said with the development of the system, it would cease to conduct the usual fiscal verification exercise it conducts for retiring government workers to determine the quantum of their accrued rights each year.
PenCom at a four day workshop for Pension Desk Officers of the Treasury-funded Ministries, Departments and Agencies in the South-west zone held in Lagos, said the system would enable respective retirees to seamlessly effect their enrollment anywhere they are without bothering to see the commissions’ officers .
PenCom Commissioner, Technical, Anyim Nyerere, said after the workshop, the commission would in the next two months commence the online enrollment exercise.
He noted before now, the commission had maintained its culture of conducting annual physical retirement verification and enrolment exercise on the federal government of Nigeria employees of the Treasury Funded Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) scheduled for retirement within the next fiscal year.
He said the exercise enables the commission validate and determine retirees’ accrued pension liabilities for budgetary allocation by the federal government.
Nyerere, however, regretted that between 2020 and 2021, the commission was unable to do this because of the pandemic and the fact that the exercise usually pulls large crowd together.
“PenCom regrets their inability to conduct this physical annual pre-retirement enrolment exercise due to the Global Covid-19 pandemic. The need to observe the necessary safety measures as directed by the government thus becomes inevitable.
“The PDOs and the public within the pension industry will appreciate the challenges in not conducting the physical pre-retirement enrolment exercise.
“Hence, the Commission’s desire to ensure that this exercise must be done so as not to affect the validation and determination of the accrued pension liabilities of the would be retirees for the government budgetary purposes,” he explained.
