NSSA’s blunders

The National Social Security Association which has made a series of risky investments which could cost pensioners has been dolling out cheap loans to its own staff. General Manager James Matiza admitted to the Public Accounts Parliamentary Portfolio Committee today that the authority had given out loans totalling US$23.7 million to staff including himself. The money was for personal, vehicle, educational, long service and housing loans at rates below market rates. The rates ranged from zero for educational loans to three to five percent for other loans well below the market rate of seven percent. Matiza told another committee that NSSA had invested millions in banks some of which had collapsed. It had also given the Rainbow Tourism Group in which it had a 36 percent stake US$14.3 million to settle a debt and buy furniture for Beitbridge Hotel which was considered a bad investment. NSSA also gave US$5.3 million to Star Africa Corporation, in which it has 24 percent shareholding and US$2.1 million to Masvingo City Council for infrastructure development in a suburb where it intends to build 680 houses. NSSA gave money to Royal Bank but it recovered its money when the bank went broke. It also recovered the US$25 million it lent to Metropolitan Bank but has so far not been able to recover the money it lent to Interfin because the bank is under curatorship.

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