Pension Administrators or human exploiters

All of us will get old one day. The current pension manipulations should be stopped by us Nigerians now.

I was very happy when the Senate recently made a move to adjust the pensions act to enable Nigerians withdraw up to seventy five percent of their cumulative savings.The liberty should even extend to allowing pensioners withdraw their whole sum.The law could also give pensioners the liberty to either withdraw their total sum or give the pension administrators the kind of investments they want.

I will make a simple illustration here.

Mallam Karfi retires at sixty and has N20m as his saving..He accesses 50% of N20m which equals N10million.The balance N10million is to be spread over 180 months (15years) and Mallam Karfi earns N55,555 monthly for 15yrs and he stops earning anything because he is expected to die at 75.

If Karfi will be allowed to have his total sum of N20m, ceteris paribus( all things being equal) he could invest in the money market or Government Treasure bills.

Currently and authoritatively N20m fetches up to 15% on a 70 days tenor. Meaning N20million gives about N3 million per annum. Divide N3million by 365 days and multiply by 30 days gives Mallam Karfi a monthly earning of N246,575 without depleting his capital of N20m.

Why have we been quiet? Nigerians should wake up from this very deep slumber. The sum given to an average pensioner is not up to the interest the administrators make on his/her capital.

The National Assembly and the Senate should save the Nigerian elder now.

This is for the information of those of us about to retire. By the way there are those that retired from federal Agency for the past eight months that are yet to receive anything.

Mudi Sani Yelwa mudlwa@ yahoo.co.uk