SSS refutes Drilon: Contribution hike is not ‘invalid and illegal’

The Social Security System (SSS) Building on East Avenue, Quezon City. (Photo by RAFFY LERMA/Philippine Daily Inquirer)

The planned increase in contributions to the Social Security System (SSS) pension is not, as Sen. Franklin Drilon said, “invalid and illegal.”

In a statement issued on Thursday, SSS Chairman Dean Amado Valdez said that the pension hike, which takes effect January 2017, would be be financed by current contributions and investment income.

On Tuesday, Drilon rejected the plan of the Duterte administration to raise the rate of the monthly contribution of SSS members.

He said it would be against the law for the SSS to impose a 1.5 percent increase on the monthly premium of its members starting in May to finance the additional P1,000 pension hike for its retirees this January was against the law.

READ: SSS premium hike against the law, says Drilon

Valdez said that the contribution hike by May of this year would be used to “expand the Investment Reserve Fund, to generate higher yields for investments, and to further strengthen the viability of the pension fund for future obligations.”

“SSS is mandated to promote social justice by providing meaningful benefits to its members when they retire,” Valdez added. /ATM