PenCom Refutes Paying Workers N3M Per Month
The National Pension Commission (PenCom) has refuted claiming alleging that its highest paid worker earns N3 million salary per month.
This was contained in a statement during the weekend by the commission, saying mischief makers were behind the assertion.
Nexus News gathered that the National Assembly had said the pension commission budgeted N12 billion for its 500 workers in one year.
According to a house of representatives member and member of the Committee on Finance, Aminu Suleiman, with a budget of N12 billion for 500 workers, it implied that on the average, a PenCom worker was paid N24 million per annum.
Also, the lawmaker had conveyed shock while examining the accounts of the commission where N12 billion was said to have been spent on the salaries of PenCom workers in one year.
“At an average of N2.4 million per month, are you telling me that the most junior personnel in PenCom earns as much as N2.4 million per month?” he had queried.
However, in its statement, PenCom said: “Following the false and misleading information on the compensation package of the National Pension Commission (PenCom) being circulated in the traditional and social media, it has become necessary to set the record straight in the interest of the Nigerian public.
“It is being alleged that the least paid PenCom employee earns a salary of ?3 million per month. This has fueled all sorts of false allegations and unfair insinuations.
“The public is invited to note that the claim is absolutely false. The highest paid official of the commission earns less than ?1 million a month. It is, therefore, completely illogical and improbable that the least paid will earn a monthly salary of N3 million.
“We understand that there is an element of mischief and possible blackmail on the commission’s compensation package. From our understanding, it appears someone calculated all staff costs, including training, staff exit benefit scheme, and employer’s pension contribution, and divided the total by the number of the commission’s employees and concluded that the least paid employee is on a monthly salary of ?3 million. There is a clear difference between staff cost and staff salaries.”
The commission clarified that from its commencement in 2004, the Federal Government directed its board to adopt an employee compensation policy that favourably compares to comparator government bodies in the financial services sector, such as the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), the Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation (NDIC) and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
