PenCom to recover N1.3bn pension debt from media organisations- PenCom D-G

Credit: NAN

The Director-General (D-G) of the National Pension Commission (PenCom), Omolola Oloworaran, has said that newspaper organisations in the country were owing retired journalists more than N1.3 billion unpaid pension contributions.

The management of the commission, in a statement in Abuja on Tuesday, indicated that Oloworaran disclosed this when she led a delegation of the commission to the Nigerian Press Council (NPC).

She expressed concerns over the widespread non-compliance with the Pension Reform Act 2014 (PRA 2014) among media establishments.

According to the statement, PenCom and the NPC have entered into a strategic collaboration to prevail on newspaper organisations to settle the huge pension liabilities owed to their employees.

”The PRA 2014 mandates that employers remit monthly pension contributions into employees’ Retirement Savings Accounts (RSAs) no later than seven days after salary payments.”

The PenCom DG said that many media houses have failed to adhere to this requirement, prompting the commission to assign recovery agents to audit and determine their outstanding pension debts and applicable penalties.

Oloworaran noted that journalists deserve to retire with dignity as they play a vital role at ensuring accountability across the public and private sectors.

She added that media organisations in turn must lead by example by fulfilling pension obligations to their employees.

She appealed to the NPC for support in advocating compliance within the media sector as pension contributions were a critical safeguard against old age poverty.

”Pension is a vital component of our social security system, and even the government has begun to take it more seriously,” she said.

The NPC Executive Secretary, Dr Dili Ezughah, reiterated the council’s support and commitment to addressing the issues.

Ezughah said that the NPC would escalate the matter to relevant stakeholders, including the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ) and the Nigerian Guild of Editors, highlighting the significant impact of unpaid pensions on journalists’ welfare.

He noted that the failure of media organisations to remit pension contributions were significant challenge in the Nigerian media industry.

Recently, the PenCom DG has been leading an aggressive enforcement drive, building strategic partnerships with regulatory agencies.

The aim is to recover unpaid pension contributions running into billions of Naira from organisations.

However, the focus on the media sector is highly significant being the first time of conducting such high-level engagements towards resolving the lingering issues.