The Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT) has launched a campaign to help educate the public on pensions and enrol more self-employed on the scheme.
Dubbed ‘Ye Wo Abonten’, an internal initiative mooted by the Ladies Club of SSNIT, the campaign is under the Self-Employed Enrolment Drive (SEED), which was launched by SSNIT in Kumasi in May this year, to help the self-employed to register for the SSNIT pension scheme.
As part of the campaign which would end by the end of the year, the staff of SSNIT across the country would on every last Friday of the month visit targeted business enclaves to educate and enrol self-employed and informal sector workers on SSNIT.
Also, as part of the launch of the ‘Ye Wo Abonten’ programme, the staff of SSNIT, mostly women, stormed the Central Business District of Accra and interacted with traders and market operators and registered them on the SSNIT scheme.
The Deputy Director-General of SSNIT in charge of Finance and Administration, Michael Addo, speaking at the launch of the programme last Friday, said as good and secure the pension SSNIT was, only about 2 per cent of the 1.9 million workers who had insured their incomes with SSNIT were self-employed.
“This means several millions of workers have no assurance of monthly pensions during their old age, and this is heartbreaking and scary,” he stated.
Mr Addo said SSNIT took a bold step by rolling out the SEED to address that challenge, and reducing the burden placed on people in active service to take care of their aged parents.
He said the campaign was being done simultaneously in most of the SSNIT offices across the country.
Mr Addo said about 1000 staff of SSNIT across the country participated in the exercise, and about 500 self-employed were expected to be registered in Accra alone.
Mr Addo said by signing up and making monthly contributions, the self-employed in the informal sector stood the chance, to among others, benefit from old age pension, invalidity pension and survivor’s lump sum benefit for dependents.
The Deputy Director-General in charge of Operations and Benefits, Ms Pearl Nana Ama Darko, said the ‘Ye Wo Abonten’ initiative was one of the four key internal activations or strategies aimed at encouraging the uptake of the SEED.
She said the programme was to take the services of SSNIT closer to the public, instead of sitting comfortably in the offices and expecting potential clients to come and enrol with SSNIT.
Ms Darko entreated all the staff to be involved in the programme irrespective of their job schedule or rank to ensure that self-employed persons understand the value the Scheme offered and voluntarily join to safeguard their future.
She said the National Pensions Act 2008, Act 766, mandated SSNIT to provide income security for all workers in Ghana, and that no one should be left behind as “We seek to reduce old age poverty”.
Some of the self-employed who spoke to the Ghanaian Times commended SSNIT for bringing the services of the Trust to their doorstep.
BY KINGSLEY ASARE
