National Pension Commission (PenCom) said due to low growth and difficulty in pushing the micro pension scheme to the informal sector target market, it would redesign the Micro Pension Plan to make it more attractive and boost financial inclusion, especially in the informal sector.
PenCom stated this at an insurance and pension forum in Lagos.
Micro Pension Plan is an arrangement under the Contributory Pension Scheme that allows the self-employed and persons working in organisations with less than three employees to make financial contributions towards the provision of pension for their retirement or upon incapacitation.
It was launched since 2019 by the late former President Muhammadu Buhari. But it had recorded very slow growth, recording only 172,936 contributors between 2019 and 2024. Director-General, PenCom, Omolola Oloworaran, who was represented by Head, Corporate Communications, PenCom, Ibrahim Buwai, at the forum, said majority of the Nigerian workforce was in the informal sector and there was need to capture them in the pension net.
Oloworaran said, “Let’s talk about this issue of expanding the Contributory Pension Scheme towards increasing financial inclusion to grow the informal sector.
