{"id":7563,"date":"2014-03-21T06:41:10","date_gmt":"2014-03-21T06:41:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/4cd.e16.myftpupload.com\/?p=7563"},"modified":"2014-03-21T06:41:10","modified_gmt":"2014-03-21T06:41:10","slug":"ghanaian-employers-flouting-pensions-law","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=7563","title":{"rendered":"Ghanaian employers flouting pensions law"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"v05dth2ssn_npra\"<\/a>Only one in five employers registered with the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT) has also signed on to a second-tier pension scheme, which is mandatory, Laud Senanu, acting chief executive of the National Pensions Regulatory Authority (NPRA), has said.<\/p>\n

Speaking to the B&FT on the sidelines of a regional outreach programme<\/span> of the NPRA in Kumasi, Mr. Senanu<\/span> said the situation is worrying given what has gone into educating the public and workings of the scheme.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are quite a few challenges we are facing in the implementation of the pension reforms. One is the slow registration of second- tier schemes. Even though SSNIT has over 42,000 registered employers, as at<\/span> February only about 7,200 had registered second-tier schemes,\u201d he disclosed.<\/p>\n

\u201cIdeally, because the first and second tiers are both mandatory, we must have the same number of establishments paying both first tier and second tier,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

The current three-tier pension system, enacted into law in 2008, demands employers to register their pension scheme managed by SSNIT and a second-tie<\/span> work-based scheme that is privately managed.<\/p>\n

The third-tier is voluntary and includes provident funds and personal pension schemes.<\/p>\n

The reforms, which ended the monopoly of SNNIT, were hailed as a major step toward improving the retirement conditions of workers through competition that will maximise<\/span> the returns earned on pension investments.<\/p>\n

It is projected that the reforms will grow the assets of the pension industry from GH\u00a21.<\/span>06 billion to GH\u00a25.<\/span>5 billion over the next four years.<\/p>\n

The NPRA has licenced<\/span> 25 corporate trustees who have responsibility for managing second- and third-tier schemes.<\/p>\n

According to Mr. Senanu<\/span>: \u201cA year or a year and half ago, there were no corporate trustees and others; but the corporate trustees have been licenced<\/span> for over a year now, and we have been carrying out education. So why are they not registering? That’s a major challenge, and we are conducting research to find exactly what went wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the meantime the NPRA has asked SSNIT to collect the mandatory 5 percent contribution from employers which have yet to register second-tier schemes.<\/p>\n

He added that in spite of the efforts to deepen stakeholder and public understanding on<\/span> the new pension reforms, the NPRA lacks the funds and resources to accelerate the implementation process.<\/p>\n

This has led to its inability to establish offices across the various regions of the country and expand its staff strength.<\/p>\n

To partly ease this challenge, the Swiss government offered a $2.4 million grant to the NPRA in March to implement initiatives aimed at boosting its capacity to’ effectively regulate the industry.<\/p>\n

Under the terms of the agreement, the Swiss State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) will support the NPRA through training of staff and improvement in its institutional framework.<\/p>\n

Mr. Senanu<\/span> urged employees and employers, both in the public and private sector, to be more conscious of their rights and obligations under the three-tier system.<\/p>\n

He said the regulator has taken measures to monitor and supervise the activities of licenced<\/span> corporate trustees and other private entities involved in the industry.<\/p>\n

Participants at the forum in Kumasi were taken through the various aspects of the scheme. It is expected that the sensitisation<\/span> and public education exercise<\/span> will be continued in other regions of the country.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Credit: B&FT<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Only one in five employers registered with the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT) has also signed on to a second-tier pension scheme, which is mandatory, Laud Senanu, acting chief executive of the National Pensions Regulatory Authority (NPRA), has said. Speaking to the B&FT on the sidelines of a regional outreach programme of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":14,"featured_media":7564,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[43,38,4],"class_list":["post-7563","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-health","tag-foresight-medical-center","tag-palaver-newspaper","tag-st-augustines-college"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7563","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7563"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7563\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7564"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7563"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7563"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7563"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}