Rwanda Social Security Board headquarters in Kigali. Sam Ngendahimana).
Rwanda
Social Security Board (RSSB)’s reported increase in the number of new
employees registering for pension scheme is a sign that more jobs are
being created every year in the country and a culture of saving for
retirement taking root.
At the announcement of RSSB’s performance
in the completed fiscal year 2018-2019, the fund’s
officials said that
133,026 new employees had registered for the body’s pension scheme
during the year, essentially contributing money towards their
retirement.
The figure is compared to 109,287 new
employees who had been registered for pension in the previous fiscal
year 2017-2018 and 103,444 registered in year 2016-2017.
The Contributions Division Manager at RSSB, Joseph Nduwamungu, told The New Times
that factors behind the steady increase in new employees registering
for pension include more jobs being created in the country and improved
awareness about saving for retirement.
“When jobs are created, new employees are
registered under RSSB schemes. The second factor for the increase is
awareness among employers and employees of the benefits of saving for
old age, workplace hazards and maternity leave. The third factor is
awareness campaigns that are carried out regularly,” he said in an
interview on Thursday.
RSSB currently manages five schemes that
include pensions, occupational hazards, community-based health insurance
(CBHI), maternity leave benefits, and Ejo Heza long term savings
scheme.
Nduwamungu emphasised that of all the
factors behind the steady increase in the number of new contributors
towards their pension scheme is the new jobs being created, explaining
that “factors are many but the main one is job creation”.
“The increase in pension scheme registration is certainly a consequence of job creation. The two go together,” he said.
Through different initiatives, the Rwandan
government has targeted to create 1.5 million decent and productive
jobs by 2024 or an average of 214,000 jobs annually.
The plan has been laid out in the
government’s first National Strategy for Transformation (NST1), which is
a seven-year programme since 2017.
Nduwamungu said that as new jobs get
created every year, there is hope that those who remember to save for
their retirement will also increase.
“We are quite confident that this pace
will be maintained easily as new employers are coming in different
sectors of activity. We have also eased the process of registering new
employees, where the employer does not have to come physically at RSSB,
but rather uses the employee ID number to register him or her online
using RSSB website,” he said.
The official explained that it used to be a
burden for employers to register new employees, but now the only thing
to do for them is to use the employee’s national identity card number
(ID number) and once put in the RSSB system, the employee’s full
identification is displayed.
“When the employer approves the
identification as correct, in one click the employer gets an RSSB
identifier to use all his or her lifetime. As simple as that,” he said.
RSSB’s Director General, Richard Tusabe,
announced this week that the fund’s investment portfolio had reached
Rwf1 trillion after a good performance registered by the body in the
last fiscal year 2018-2019.
In order to remain profitable and meet its
obligations towards its contributors over the long term, the fund
invests in different areas such as buying shares in profitable
companies, making profitable deposits in commercial banks, and building
real estate for both sale and rent.
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