Corruption in Sartunia Pension Fund
SATURNIA is an institution steeped in corruption.
The corruption, insider trading and un-ethical conduct are so blatant, nauseating and a clear case of high level collusion and complicity which must be dealt with in the most severe manner possible.
Government must also investigate and sanction severely international auditing firms that have not only issued clean audit reports but have failed to report clear abuse of the law and business ethics.
Pension funds were recklessly invested in companies in which principals had business interests in contravention of ethics and practice because no governance structures were allowed to operate.
Saturnia presents the worst form of corporate corruption, ever witnessed in this country, which must be condemned in the strongest terms by all those championing the cause of national and institutional integrity.
We find it incredible and certainly hypocritical that civil society, which like the media should serve as the conscience of the nation has remained aloof and insular to the diabolical and unethical conduct of those in the corporate world, concentrating instead on public corruption.
For the last two years, we have single handedly exposed corruption at Saturnia Pension Fund which threatens the savings of more than 30, 000 contributors.
These are men and women that have laboured in the hope of securing a retirement devoid of financial impecunuity.
Civil society has remained aloof and indeed some media organisations have taken cause against our coverage insinuating malice. We of course appreciate that fighting corruption is risky and in some cases life threatening as has been evidenced by recent incidents where we were fire bombed and one of our workers seriously assaulted as a way of intimidation.
As a newspaper committed to the promotion of integrity and wellbeing of the ordinary people we have taken the high road to fight corruption wherever and whenever it manifests appreciating the associated risks.
A vital tenet of integrity is transparency and a level of rectitude that pervades institutional character and image. There has never been such accountant ability in Saturn ia.
We are today reproducing an internal report generated by former trustees who risked their tenure by reporting glaring irregularities to the Pensions and Insurance Authority which did not make any effort to address any of the very fundamental requisites of a pension fund.
They knew, it was wrong, immoral, unethical and certainly against normal pension practice for the fund to have been managed by related companies. The fund manager African Life Financial Services and Benefits Consulting Limited and Menel performing seemingly unrelated companies owned by the same individuals.
What is most shocking is the impunity with which an irregular, corrupt and wholly un-acceptable institutional structure was allowed to exist by a regulatory agency - PIA.
For one year, PIA banished the elected Trustees from conducting any business of the fund on account of their opposition to the capture of the fund by two private companies African Financial Services which served as Fund Manager and Benefits Consulting Limited, the Fund Administrator.
Mr Muna Hantuba, a major shareholder in African Life Financial Services and in Benefit Consulting Services sued the trustees in suits that were dismissed by the Lusaka High Court and yet it was the trustees that were put to pasture and not allowed to meet for a full year until the fateful February meeting this year at which they were removed.
The captured and compromised PIA was fully complicit in this irregularity and the failure by Government to rectify the situation will spell disaster for the fund.