Al-Jazirah WHEN the Shoura Council approved a proposal a year ago raising the retirement age to 62 years, the Public Pension Agency (PPA) was suffering from a deficit. It claimed that it was due to an increase in early retirements among its subscribers, although the number didn't exceed 25 percent of the subscribers. The deficit reveals mismanagement and inappropriate investment of the agency's funds. PPA subscribers include civil and military employees, and teachers who constitute a large chunk of society. These billions of riyals could provide retirees with a luxurious and prosperous life, but instead the agency increased the deduction to five percent for civilians and seven percent for the military. This was a quick attempt to cover the deficit. What is taking place in the PPA? Why does not it discloses, with all transparency, what is actually happening? Why does not the PPA send a clear, transparent and in-depth report to all government authorities on its investments, not only in the past few years, but during its long history? The report should show how it invested funds deducted from the salaries of civil and military employees. It is the right of these employees, however low their posts might be, to know what happened to the small amounts deducted from their salaries throughout their 40, or so, years of work. So long as the PPA continues to remain silent, there will be doubts about its efficiency in managing pensioners' funds. Such doubts and suspicions have spread widely on social media. There are rumors that the PPA invested these funds in the Saudi stock market, hence causing billions of riyals to vanish in November 2006 amid the SR3 trillion loss the market suffered. It was the bourse's disastrous crash the Saudis will never forget. Speculation continues about the performance of a financial institution that, for decades, has been deducting amounts from Saudis' salaries. The purpose is to compensate them later during their retirement and enable them to live a decent life.
