The National Pension Commission (PenCom) has disclosed that it had recovered a total of over N11 billion between 2013 till date from erring firms through its recovering agents.

The Commissions Secretary and Legal Adviser Muhammad S Muhammad confirmed this at a two days workshop organized by the commission for finance, Pension, Insurance, Labour correspondents and Business Editors in Calabar, the Cross River State capital.

Muhammad, who maintained that non remittance is a criminal offense said the Commission was working with the Economic and Financial Crime Commission (EFCC) to ensure all outstanding contributions were remitted.

According to him, the issue of non remittance could come in form of when a company have not been deducting from the word go and as such, the pension liabilities will have to accumulate, adding that in a situation like that,the commissions recovering agents go in to recover both principal funds and the penalty for non remittance.

On the other, he said a situation where employers will deduct money but will not remit, such a company, he said will be handed over to criminal investigating department for appropriate action.

On whether there had been situations when the commission handed over companies to EFCC in the past, he noted that there had been adding that it was mostly those transiting from the insured pension scheme into the new scheme.
Well there had been, mostly while handling issues of people transiting from the insured pension scheme into the new scheme. And you see situations where companies hold on to funds and don’t remit or you have others that will tell that they have transferred it insurance companies, where it is with the insurance companies, we engage the National Insurance Commission (NAICOM) and they will then take the appropriate measure to ensure the funds are transfer to the Pension Funds Administers (PFAs) and Pension Funds Custodians (PFCs)