National Social Security Fund of Rwanda (SSFR) has started cracking down employers who do not remit their employees’ social contributions.

There are reports that many employers are defaulting paying the annual social contributions for their employees, making the Treasury lose revenue in millions of francs.

SSFR estimated that up to 40 per cent employers may not be paying their workers’ social contributions.

"There has been inconsistent in the number of active employers. This prompted us (SSFR) to conduct this operation to know why it has been fluctuating," said Daniel Kayonga, the SSFR publicist.

SSFR records show that there were 3,756 employers in the previous years, but currently only 1,675 pay their employees’ contributions, meaning 2,096 employers are defaulting.

"Our experience on this inconsistent shows that employees are being cheated by their employers and denying them their rights," Kayong said.

The operation has started in Kigali City, with a team inspecting institutions that are suspected not to be contributing.

The investigators compare the salary sheet with the number of declared workers and contributions remitted per employee.

A penalty of 1.5 per cent is charged when declarations are not done on time, 1.5 per cent on delays to remit contributions per month and 18 per cent for both annually.

SSFR is mandated by the Ministerial Decree of 3rd September 2004 to conduct such exercise and has the power to close down institutions.

In recovering money, SSFR can confiscate the defaulters’ property and auction it. Last year Frw2 billion was recovered from 148 cases.

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