25,000 state employees at risk of losing pensions

OVER 25,000 government employees may lose their pension and other benefits unless some government agencies and local government units pay P2.38 billion in contributions and loan payments, the pension fund said Thursday.

Some 287 government agencies and local government units were suspended at the end of June for not remitting their employees’ premiums, loan payments, and other compulsory contributions that had been withheld from their salaries, pension fund spokesman Margie Jorillo said.

As a result, she said, some 25,454 employees were ineligible to apply for loans or receive cash dividends.

Local government units account for a third of the delinquents in the GSIS list, and those include Caloocan City, which is P341 million in arrears. Its suspension is affecting some 1,600 GSIS members.

The others in the list are government-owned and -controlled corporations such as Philippine Postal Corp. and Philippine National Railways, line agencies, public schools and local water districts.

The GSIS has asked them to cooperate, saying they are responsible for ensuring that the pension fund’s members get what is due them.

“Suspended agencies can enter into a memorandum of agreement with the GSIS to settle their outstanding obligations,” pension fund president Robert Vergara said. Elaine Ramos-Alanguilan, Manila Standard Today