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President Arroyo renewed her call for the Social
Security System (SSS) to widen its coverage and capture overseas
land and sea-based workers to be part of the SSS membership.
“I encourage your strategic
plans to expand your membership through mandatory coverage of all
OFWs, especially seafarers,” the President told SSS officials
during their 50th anniversary Monday.
“The SSS, at 50, has done a
good job balancing vital functions of capital build-up and support
for national social programs along the mandate of providing a
lifeline to its members.”
The President also urged the SSS
to push for the amendment of its charter to institutionalize
actuarial standards and formulas and make it more responsive to the
challenges of time.
The agency said it is exploring
ways to entice overseas Filipino workers to avail themselves of its
protection.
SSS President Corazon de la Paz
said the fund is considering two options to make this happen, either
through legislation or cooperation with government agencies.
De la Paz said her agency could
coordinate with Philippine Overseas Employment Administration in
drafting a regulation “wherein [workers] would be asked to
register and have the option to be members of SSS before leaving the
country to work overseas.”
The other alternative of making
OFW membership mandatory through a legislative measure is based on
Republic Act 7655 requiring SSS coverage of household helps, which
lawmakers passed in 1993.
The law stipulated that domestic
helpers 60 years of age and below and receiving a monthly pay of at
least P1,000 must be registered with the SSS. Compulsory coverage
takes effect on the day the helper is engaged by a household.
“Whatever form it would take,
our objective is to make the OFW an SSS member for their future
protection,” de la Paz said.
Only a handful of more than 8
million OFWs are classified as pension fund members on voluntary
basis.
“We want to get OFWs into our
fold so they can enjoy the same benefits being given to SSS members
based in the Philippines, particularly when they retire. It is
pitiful seeing many OFWs end up with nothing when they are old and
back in the country after working so hard abroad in their younger
days,” de la Paz said.
It is estimated that SSS
contributions from OFWs alone may leap to P10 billion annually if
only 1 million of them will contribute at least P10,000 yearly. The
maximum annual contribution is more than P18,000 for someone earning
at least $300 per month.
The reported increase in assets
and investment income in the last six months, to P248 billion and
P15.5 billion, respectively. This allows the SSS to double the
pensions given to its members in the last 12 months; 10 percent in
September last year and another 10 percent last month.
The fund rebounded from a
possible financial collapse more than six years ago through
aggressive reform programs. Financial experts previously predicted
that SSS would run out of fund by 2015 if no reform measures were
carried out.
--Angelo S. Samonte
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