What to do with GSIS

The change at the top of the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) offers new hope for thousands of past and present state employees. Under various computerization programs instituted by Winston Garcia, GSIS president and general manager from 2001 to last month, grave problems have hampered services and pension payments to countless fund members.

Garcia rightly took pride in reforms that rid beneficiary lists of deceased pensioners and other irregularities.

He also lengthened the GSIS’s actuarial life, or the number of years of benefits that its present assets and future investment returns could cover. From 28 years in 2001, he stretched actuarial life by 55 years as of 2009, with assets up 126 percent in the same period to P572 billion, despite annual payouts of claims and benefits up by two-thirds since 2001, to about P30 billion today.

But all those glowing numbers have done little to assuage the complaints of many public servants, who have even booed GSIS employees in public gatherings. The woes persisted, despite more than one computer system upgrading, plus a dressing down or two from no less than former President Gloria Arroyo herself.

A year ago, as part of strategic initiatives to boost morale in the bureaucracy, the Civil Service Commission (CSC) did a nationwide survey of GSIS concerns in the bureaucracy. As CSC chairman, this writer sent the survey report to Garcia, and led CSC officials to discuss solutions with him, GSIS Chairman Bernardino Abes, and the rest of the fund board at their boardroom in August.

Among concerns raised were years-delayed or much reduced payments to pensioners, as well as widespread discrepancies in remittance records of premium and loan payments, for which GSIS members were denied salary loans. There were also mystery borrowings in the records of civil servants who had never borrowed from the pension fund. One of them was a retired CSC chairman.

The GSIS board led by Chairman Bernardino Abes agreed to set up a joint task force with the CSC to address concerns in the survey. GSIS officials had wanted to address the concerns of Congress, the Supreme Court and the CSC first; these entities could put pressure on the fund. But the commission argued for other priorities: pensions delayed or diminished and salary loans denied, all because of record discrepancies; and the mystery borrowings. The first two issues burden retirees and poor workers with little else to rely on for their living expenses besides pensions and loans, while the third may well constitute grand theft.

The GSIS accepted the priorities suggested by the CSC for the joint task force. First, address discrepancies in accounts of retired or retiring personnel, so they can get pensions in full and upon retirement (or now for retirees). Second, do the same for the records of low-wage staff, so they can avail themselves of GSIS credit. And third, conduct a thorough probe of possible loan fraud victimizing employees who never borrowed, yet have debt in the books, sometimes for years before anomalies are discovered. If necessary, the NBI should be brought in.

The CSC-GSIS task force had several meetings even after this writer was removed as CSC chairman by the Commission on Appointments (CA) in September, but one cannot recall any remedial action being reported so far. (At a CA plenary session in mid-October, a pro-minent lawyer on the GSIS board was photographed keenly watching the proceedings and shaking the hands of CA members after they affirmed the CSC chairman’s rejection.)

Some months ago Arroyo issued an executive order making the CSC head an ex-officio board member of major provident agencies catering for public sector employees. With the aim of ensuring ample attention to their needs and interests, the Executive Order (EO) named the CSC chairman, now former health secretary Francisco Duque, to the boards of the Pag-IBIG housing fund, the Philippine Health Insurance Corp., and the GSIS. This writer was told, however, that the previous GSIS management had not complied with the EO.

What to do with the GSIS? New President and General Manager Daniel Lacson takes over the fund with strong credentials, having been president of the Philippine National Bank in the first Aquino Administration, and a progressive governor of Negros Occidental. He is also chairman emeritus of shipping giant Negros Navigation, and founding chairman of the Negros Business Forum.

For starters, the state pension fund CEO may do well to implement the EO mandating a board seat for the CSC chair. With civil service Chairman Duque, Lacson could also review the work of the CSC-GSIS task force, and see if longsuffering retired and low-income members are finally getting effective relief. And don’t forget the mystery loans. After so much hard work and big money devoted to GSIS machines, it’s about time its members got the attention of its bosses. –RICARDO SALUDO, Manila Times

opinion@manilatimes.net