16 council directors to be punished for pension delays

Prime Minister Mizengo Pinda

Prime Minister Mizengo Pinda has threatened to take disciplinary action against 16 council directors who breached the agreement reached outside court of submitting members’ contributions to Local Authorities Pension Fund in time.

He said failure to remit the contributions was causing inconveniences to the retired workers in getting their benefits.

Pinda was speaking in Dar es Salaam yesterday at the official opening of the fourth LAPF Annual Stakeholders Conference.

He said it was disappointing that the employers failed to submit the contributions to the fund, though workers’ salary slips reflected the deductions.

“Most employers sometimes submit the contributions late or less than the required amounts. I want to stress that submitting the contributions outside the legal time is an offense according to the law,” he said.

The PM explained that failure to submit members’ contributions to the scheme was against the LAPF Act, attracting a penalty of 5 percent interest on the contributions to defaulters, an unnecessary burden to the councils.

“Why should the councils pay the money … a person who failed to pay the contributions on time should be punished accordingly…I don’t understand why these directors fail to submit the members contributions on time, if they have already been deducted from their salaries,” wondered the PM.

He said according to reports, a total of 51 directors had been taken to court for breach of the law, with 16 of them settling the cases out of court, which also violated the agreements.

“I need to get a detailed report on councils which were brought before the court and those who breached the agreements outside the court in order to take action against them,” Pinda stressed.

He added: “Fortunately all these are under my office …I direct Minister of State responsible for Regional Administration and Local Governments George Mkuchika to be strict to ensure that all the members contributions were paid on time.”

He stressed that the government was not be ready to see the retired members encounter inconveniences in getting their benefits due to negligence by their employers.

The councils which are alleged to breach the agreement included Ludewa, Makete, Babati, Bahi, Chamwino, Rombo, Kilwa, Kisarawe, Monduli, Longido and Kondoa.

Others are Iringa district council, Iringa municipal council, Lindi municipal council, Shinyanga municipal council and Kibaha Township council.

Pinda directed the Ministry of Finance to continue with the system of deducting debts owed to LAPF directly from the funds set aside for the councils if they failed to make the payments voluntarily.

The Premier challenged the social security schemes to educate employers on retirement preparations.

“Retirement preparations and plans have been left to the retirees for a long time…the situation has caused difficulties in their lives immediately after they leave jobs due to lack of sufficient preparations and planning,” he said.

The theme of the conference is: “Promoting Understanding of the Social Security in Tanzania.”

For his part LAPF Director General Eliud Sanga said in the 2010/2011 financial year, LAPF registered 7,688 new employees bringing membership to 80,529 by June this year.

He said the fund planned to register 90,726 members by the end of 2011/2012.

Sanga said that in a bid to ensure members were paid promptly, LAPF has established a system which required employers to submit important documents of the members so that they could be paid their benefits six months before they retire.

He said currently the time for preparing the workers benefits has dropped from three months in 2007/2008 to one month in 2010/2011.

‘Our aim is to pay the members their benefits seven days after submitting their applications,” Sanga said.

Dar es Salaam Regional Commissioner Said Meck Sadik called on the Social Security schemes to look into the possibilities of entering into joint ventures with Dar es Salaam municipal councils by investing in various areas including constructing modern markets and abattoirs.

He cited Kariakoo market and Vingunguti abattoir saying they needed to be constructed into modern structures.

SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN