Govt considers biometric system for civil servants

THE Government is considering registering all civil servants on the biometric system as a way of weeding out ghost workers.

Responding to legislators during the National Assembly question and answer session on Wednesday, the Minister of Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare, Cde Prisca Mupfumira, said biometric registration was the way to go to curb corruption.

She said NSSA has introduced biometric registration of pensioners to smoke out those who must not be receiving any pay-outs.

“This programme that we have started on pensioners will extend to all NSSA contributors as they are expected to be registered biometrically. We are looking forward that this programme which we have started with NSSA pensioners, will be extended to our Government workers,” said Cde Mupfumira.

“We also want to reach the vulnerable, those who are over 70 and those who live with disability, we are moving forward with this programme so that everyone should be captured so that we know the number of people that we have who want to be helped.”

The Minister said NSSA embarked on biometric registration to avoid releasing money to “non-existent people.”

“The issue at hand is that people who were getting their pensions from NSSA, we know that some of them are dead and some may be ghost pensioners. Moving with time, we are engaging into biometrics so that with time, everyone who gets their pension from NSSA is registered,” she said.

Cde Mupfumira said although NSSA has cut off the registration of pensioners, it is still registering those who had missed the dead line up to this month end.

She said last week 27 000 pensioners were still unregistered but the number has decreased to 17 000.

“What is at stake here is that we should inform people so that they register. NSSA cannot pay ghost pensioners, those who are non-existent. So, it is up to us to ensure that anyone who does not get their money in October should come back and get registered so that we see their finger prints and eyes because we want to curb corruption,” said Cde Mupfumira.

She said pensioners were given nine months to register under the new system hence they should not complain about the time frame allocated to them.

Cde Mupfumira said the Government was committed to looking after the elderly hence the decision for NSSA to increase pensioners’ allowances.

The pay-outs were increased from $60 to 80 with effect from this month.—@nqotshili