More and more countries are coming out in the open about pension fund shortfalls, France being the latest. Back home, what’s the prognosis on our retirement funds? Has the EPF been prudently growing our money, or has it been squandering it on foolish investments?
The current spate of news reports on GLCs (government-linked companies) losing hundreds of millions of taxpayers’ money is enough to send shivers down my spine – Perwaja (RM10b), PKFZ (RM12.5b), Pos Malaysia (RM546m), Sime Darby (RM964m). These are the cases that have been exposed in the media. There are likely many more that will surface in the coming weeks. Our dirt-diggers have been working overtime.
According to EPF CEO Tan Sri Azlan Zainol, the aim of publishing the list of investments was to enhance EPF’s transparency. However, in the same breath, he says, “not everything regarding EPF’s investments could be revealed“.
Is this his personal definition of ‘transparency’? So much for keeping us informed. All the more reason we should keep a watchful eye on what the EPF is doing with our money. We don’t want to wake up one fine day to discover all our retirement savings have been wiped out by incompetent fund managers. That would hasten us to our grave faster than we can say “CELAKA!”