Essential pension scheme

The progress and future programs of the social protection board set up under the guidance of President Mahinda Rajapaksa with a view to making all adults of the country members of a pension scheme was discussed with the chairman of the Board Nimal Amarasinghe.

Following are the excerpts

What is the public interest on the pension scheme of the social protection program?

Actually the progress we have achieved is very much encouraging: We have signed agreements to recruit 30,000 workers engaged in the palmyra industry.

We have also discussed with Livestock Development and rural community Development Minister Arumugam Thondaman for recruiting five hundred thousand estate workers to the pension scheme. We discussed with the Minister and Estate Employers.

When estate workers joined the scheme we give them Insurance policies. A sum of Rs 155 will be deducted for a month from their salaries. So, when they go on retirement at the age of 60 years they get a pension payment of Rs 5,000 per month.

We recruited graduates from areas such as Nuwara Eliya, Thalawakele and Maskeliya to implement this program. They will be deployed with our officers. Under this pension scheme, if a worker becomes physically handicapped at the age of 22 he will be granted the full pension payment on the recommendation of doctors.

In addition he will be paid a distress allowance of fifty thousand rupees. If the worker dies after being entitled to the pension payment at the age of 60 years, his wife or a child below the age of 18 years will be entitled to the monthly pension payment.

Various banks and Insurance firms are competing to get people into their pension schemes. What is the way the social Protection Board facing this situation.

We don’t have a competition. We have already won the people’s confidence. Certain pension schemes do not reveal even the extent of the payment of pension they are going to pay. At the recruitment itself we disclose how much we pay after the retirement. Other institutions do not say these. We are planning to set up an office in Dubai to get the Sri Lankan workers there into our pension scheme. We have good responses from our expatriate workers. There have been requests from Singapore as well as from Kuwait.

We take them also into the pension scheme and planning to draw up a scheme to give them pension payments at their retirement at the age of 50 years.

This will be given only to Sri Lankan expatriate workers. All these we do under President Mahinda Rajapaksa’s Mahinda Chinthana concept.

The Social Protection board is functioning under the Finance Ministry. The President is personally finding out about this program. Upto now four hundred thousand workers have joined this scheme.

We are paying pension money monthly to 7625 persons. We try to increase this number of members upto six hundred thousand this year. It is not easy.

What are the benefits estate workers would get after joining the social protection scheme?

No special benefits. They get pension payments at the end of their services. We have 22 officers throughout the country. When the confidence in us is growing, the persons joining are also increasing. When we made the Estate Employers aware of this program they said it was a very good project.

They can live their old days without being a burden to their children.

What is the Social Protection Board introducing to their members in the year 2011.

We are planning to get thirty thousand engaged in the Palmyra Industry into this scheme. We have already drawn up a pension scheme for them. We signed the Memorandum of Understanding on their behalf. We have connected all our officers to the computer network. Anybody who goes to the District Secretariat they can get the details from our officer who is there. There are officers of us even in Divisional officers. They can join our scheme both in the District Secretariat and Divisional Secretariat. Our work has been easier with the computerizing of our work.

What happened to the mediamen’s pension scheme?

It is being implemented this year. It is good news. We drew up a new pension scheme for mediamen. The earlier scheme did not cover all the fields. We have handed over to the Secretary of the Media Ministry all information regarding the new pension scheme.

We are introducing a pension scheme even for cooperative workers. Cooperatives and internal Trade Minister Johnston Fernando is very keen on this scheme. We have taken action to make even three-wheeler drivers members of the pension scheme. We discussed with the three-wheeler drivers society officials. We have sent through the Defence Ministry by police stations the message to three-wheeler drivers. Our officer will go and meet them and make them members of this pension scheme. We held meetings in areas such as Narahenpita and Nugegoda to give an awareness to the three-wheeler drivers.

If you explain the present activities of the Social Protection Board?

Membership contributions will never be spent for the functioning of our institution. We have deposited all that money in a separate account. Our employees are paid by the Finance Ministry. We have a workforce of 170. A minimum workforce is working at maximum efficiency. All institutions under the President is working at maximum efficiency. We started this institution 14 years ago. But it was not known to the people. Now we have changed that situation.

How does insurance scheme suit our society?

Our culture is family centred. Elders depend on their families. They do not go to homes for elders. Elders homes culture has come to us from foreign coutnries. It is not a difficulty for us to feed our mother and father. Actually this homes of elders culture will be nowhere if our parents’ have a pension.

The President at the time when he was the Fisheries Minister started this program after seeing how our elders suffer without money. Even our Minister Arumugam Thondaman also giving us a support. Twenty-five percent of the country’s population are elders.

Therefore it is very important for our elders to join a pension scheme taking their future into consideration. Then they will be able to spend their last period of life happily.

Even children should take action to make their parents members of a pension scheme. If a person who had joined a pension scheme dies, the pension payment would be given to the person whom he had named.

What is the future program of getting the membership of people to this pension scheme?

Recently a person going on a foreign job came and got the membership. He paid the membership fee at once. Accordingly he is getting a pension of Rs 25,000 per month. There are 85 employees in a private firm in Kurunegala. All of them became our members.

There are about three million people who are engaged in self-employment. We must make them our members. Actually five hundred thousand estate workers being our members under the influence of Minister Thondaman is a great encouragement to us.

Those who are engaged in the coconut industry are also becoming our members in the near future. Although 14 years had elapsed after this introduction of this scheme we have only three hundred as members. However we increased this number by tens of thousands. There has been a request to increase the number of our officers. If there are more employees, it is easier for us to increase the number of members. There is no similarity in the pension schemes of State employees and those of the Social Protection Board.

Interviewed by Ayanthi Withana