Ministries fail to pay Shs65 billion to pensioners
Some of the pensioners at a verification exercise in Masaka District headquarters last year. Photo by Ali Mambule
Kampala- Government ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs), and local governments did not remit Shs65.6 billion for pension and gratuity to retired civil servants in the last Financial Year, the Auditor General’s (AG) latest report to Parliament indicates.
The AG states that the Shs65b was returned to the Consolidated Fund.
Of the total arrears, MDAs had not paid out Shs35b, up from Shs17.3b the previous last financial year and local governments Shs20.7b, down from Shs100.7b the previous financial year.
For the same financial year ended June 30, 2018, municipal councils did not remit Shs2.3b of pension and gratuity to its retired civil servants.
Recommendation
“Unpaid pension and gratuity negatively impacts on the well-being of the retired civil servants…affects the delicate lives of senior citizens and has a direct impact on their human rights – and needs to urgently be addressed,” the AG stated.
“I advised the accounting officers to follow up the matter with the MoFPED (Ministry of Finance) and ministry of Public Service to have the pension and gratuity arrears payments effected in a timely manner,” the AG adds.
Among the ministries, the Ministry of East African Community Affairs, accounted for the largest chunk (Shs11b) of the un-remitted pension and gratuity.
According to the report, the ministry attributed the failure to remit the money to non-existent pensioners, delayed verification and late releases of funds.
The reports says the system used to manage the pension is unable to generate automatic notifications of the retirement due dates and it takes on average between six and 12 months for human resource officers to pick up the files with queries for correction.
“I noted from review of the [Integrated Personnel and Payroll System/IPPS] electronic files that some pensioners were assigned multiple gratuity payments both on the payrolls and interface files,” states the report.
“In the event that votes do not carry out review to ascertain the accuracy of the interface files uploaded on the Integrated Financial Management System, the possibility of double payments cannot be ruled out,” the report adds.
