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Govt seeks to compensate pensioners

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GOVERNMENT is evaluating the report on pensions that were lost during the years that the country experienced an economic meltdown with plans to compensate pensioners, Finance minister Tendai Biti has said.

GOVERNMENT is evaluating the report on pensions that were lost during the years that the country experienced an economic meltdown with plans to compensate pensioners, Finance minister Tendai Biti has said.

Report by Victoria Mtomba

Speaking on the sidelines of a signing ceremony between government and Zep Re recently, Biti said the report had been completed and presented to the ministry and they were still working on it.

“We have received the report now, but someone was sitting on the report. We will soon be talking about the report. We have just received a report from actuaries and we want to ensure there is adequate protection for pensioners. We are duty-bound to do that,” Biti said.

A total of 1,2 million pensioners in the country lost the value of their pensions between 2000 and 2008 which resulted in many of them becoming poor. The majority of pensioners are now being taken care of by their children while others are failing to make ends meet.

Insurance Pension Commission (Ipec) commissioner Mannet Mpofu said the report had been done, but there were certain gaps that had to be filled.

“Whether it will be wholly government-funded, it will depend on the filling of the gaps,” Mpofu said.

The Finance ministry last year commissioned a study through Ipec, the insurance regulator, and appointed actuaries to determine the values of those policies in the post-dollarised environment.

The report is expected among other things to come up with the conversions rates and on the assets owned by the insurance companies to see which ones would be monetised.

Biti said during the hyper-inflation era, short and long-term policies lost value due to inflation and life schemes that were administered by Old Mutual and Zimre Holdings Limited were hedged against and through the purchase of assets and investments on the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange.

Meanwhile, Zimbabwe signed a host agreement with Zep Re that was set up under PTA trade area in which this country is a signatory. Zep Re shareholders include six governments, PTA Bank and African Development Bank.