P1B spent for PNP ‘ghost pensioners’—Robredo
Local Government Secretary Jesse Robredo reveals that 2,000 out of the 58,000 police pensioners are fake. MARIANNE BERMUDEZ/INQUIRER
MANILA, Philippines—The government spent about P1 billion in monthly pension for “ghost pensioners” in the Philippine National Police for the last five years, Local Government Secretary Jesse Robredo said on Thursday.
About P250 million a year was being spent since 2006 for non-existent beneficiaries of the PNP’s Retirement and Benefits Administration Service, said Robredo.
The distribution of pension of PNP retirees was temporarily stopped two weeks ago to purge the record of fake beneficiaries, he said.
Thus far, Robredo said that about 2,000 names on the roster of PNP pensioners were bogus. Their pensions cost the government cost about P250 million a year.
He said more fake pensioners could still be found since they would still look into complete records per year.
About 58,000 are currently on the list of retired police enlisted personnel.
A former policeman, identified as Marlon Reyes, has been linked to the large-scale fund scam and an investigation was still being conducted to find out who were with him in the “syndicate,” Robredo said.
