ARMM settles P890M in GSIS premium arrears

ARMM Gov. Mujiv Hataman. INQUIRER.net FILE PHOTO

COTABATO CITY, Philippines – In a bid to improve access to the services of the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS), top management executives of the agency have been going the rounds of provinces nationwide to touch-base with the firm’s 48 branches and stakeholders to get their concerns, suggestions, complaints about the granting of loans and benefits to pensioners.

For one, the use of a private (Union Bank), instead of a government bank in drawing regular pension and other benefits has been resolved when the GSIS decided to tap the services of the Land Bank of the Philippines in areas where GSIS has not set up a branch, said GSIS president and general manager Robert Vergara.

Vergara was here Saturday for a two-day meeting with stakeholders of the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, lauding efforts of the regional government to settle unremitted premiums, including arrears, of 26,000 education department employees amounting to nearly a billion pesos.

With the help of the Department of Budget and Management, as agreed upon by the GSIS and the Office of the Regional Governor, the account that ballooned to P990 million from 1997 to the present has been partly settled through a DBM check of P890 million under a signed Memorandum of Agreement.

The remaining balance of about P100 million is set to be fully paid before the year ends, according to ARMM Gov. Mujiv Hataman, who had worked out solutions to allow affected DepEd teachers and employees to avail of GSIS loans and other benefits.

Hataman’s mission to institute reform in the regional bureaucracy, according to Vergara, is also his role in the GSIS after he took over the controversy-wracked Winston Garcia leadership that saw mass action from GSIS union workers at the central office and which ended in a Supreme Court ruling upholding the workers’ rights for reform at the state-pension fund agency.

Accompanied by four GSIS executives, Vergara said they would look into the plight of government workers as it offered lately “calamity loans” to flood-affected members in Mindanao of up to P40,000 with low interest rate of six percent per annum, payable in 36 monthly installments.

He said some 4,162 qualified GSIS members in Mindanao could avail of the emergency loan program.

The GSIS also announced to have turned over a P144.2-million check to the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines for use in the rehabilitation of Tacloban City airport destroyed by Super Typhoon “Yolanda” (Haiyan) in 2013.

“We have noted all valid sentiments of stakeholders in our report to the GSIS president that needed perusal and prompt action,” said Rosalinda Mendoza, GSIS-ARMM manager.

“We have to regain the trust and confidence of our stakeholders by promoting efficient service,” said Vergara, an October recipient of an Outstanding Public Servant Award from the Public Attorneys Office based on responsive service to nearly two million GSIS members.

“Before President Aquino’s term ends, we hope to have reformed and rebuilt GSIS as the premier pension fund institution, transparent, autonomous, and beyond public reproach just like what Hataman did to ARMM in his brief stint as regional governor,” Vergara told the Philippine Daily Inquirer.