Movement for Democratic Change MDC, an alliance partner of the UPND has proposed that the recently recruited 41,772 teachers and health workers should make their contributions to the Public Service Pension Fund PSPF instead of NAPSA.
Speaking at a press briefing in Lusaka, MDC Vice President – Political Leonard Hikaumba said the Public Service Pension Fund has been depleted of new capital injection as most civil servants are making their pension contributions to NAPSA which now has a large number to cope with.
Mr Hikaumba said there is need to give NAPSA a competitor in pension administration hence the party’s proposal for government to consider placing the newly recruited civil servants under the Public Service Pension Fund.
Mr Hikaumba explained that having more civil servants make contributions to PSPF will give the institution more life and also reduce on complexity of making adjustments to NAPSA due to the large database of beneficiaries.
He said NAPSA has increasingly been seen to have challenges in copying with the large number of beneficiaries, as such, taking the newly recruited teachers and health workers to PSPF will ease this burden.
“We would like to suggest that the newly recruited teachers and health workers should contribute to the Public Service Pension Fund instead of being members of NAPSA. PSPF has been depleted of new capital injection because all government workers who are newly recruited are becoming members of NAPSA” Mr Hikaumba said.
And Mr Hikaumba said the professional conduct of police when former first lady Esther Lungu appeared for questioning at the Drug Enforcement Commission is highly commendable, unlike the overzealous conduct they exhibited in the past in similar cases.
He said the questioning was incident free as the police ensure that they maintained law and order, calling on the top command to uphold this professionalism and rise above vices that tarnished their image.
Well, I would suggest that the newly recruited civil servants should contribute to both NAPSA and PSPF. Both schemes need members and each member could contribute 5% to each entity while government should also contribute 5% towards each member’s scheme respectively. Let us not kill pension schemes like what is happening to LASF. Alternatively let employees choose their own pension fund instead of compelling them to join a particular scheme.
THE need to revive the PSPF is very sound! The same be extended to the LASF in respect of local government and other government agency workers.. NAPSA is merely a basic pension that provides the bare basic pension benefits of between 20% to 40% income replacement metrics.
In its current form, NAPSA destines public workers without supplemental occupational pensions such as LASSF and PSPF to destitution and old age poverty because NAPSA benefits are meagre, arising from the little pension contributions made to it of 5% from Employees and Employers.
Hence, there is need to revive both both the PSPF and the LASF which are occupational pension funds, in order to complement NAPSA!
Government should take this matter very seriously!
The discussion we want to hear for now is how far NAPSA has gone in implementing the UPND campaign promise that the serving NAPSA contributors can get part of their money to stimulate economic growth in the country. All other debates must be put on hold until we solve this very important campaign promise, which made me and the other 2.8 million to vote for the promise. When is it happening please, and surprisingly it has never been part of any cabinet discussion and the one year in office has reached
Just reading this f00Is name I knew he would be linked to the tribal upnd party.
Napsa and UPND, where is our money which we can get in advance. The economy is harsh, that money can assist with projects. Mr Antony Bwalya Sir, you amplified this issue again and again during campaigns, any progress?
PSPF is broke and has always been poorly managed. People die without ever seeing their money. NAPSA is the only well and professionally managed body in Zambia.