The Social Security Fund of Rwanda (SSFR) has castigated tea farmers for not remitting contributions for their part time workers. The pension fund is struggling to get casual workers with tea estates registered but says it’s meeting resistance from employers. The development was disclosed by the fund’s official in charge of customer education, Moses Kazoora during a sensitization seminar organized for tea farmers at Hilltop Motel in Remera yesterday. SSFR has since 2006 put in place compliance mechanisms that include audit and inspection, sensitization, decentralization of services, utilizing ICT for employees to check if their employers deposit the remittances. In their defence, the finance officer of one cooperative, Gerome Nsengiyumnva said it was unfair for SSFR to demand these remittances and yet some of these part timers worked for unspecified number of days within a month. “SSFR wants the employees to pay the fee (social security fund) but there are workers who work only one day or two days or mere hours,” He said that the tea estate owners are also not agreeing to the SSFR fee because of low returns their produce fetches from OCIR-THE, which buys the tea from cooperatives. Some 5000 people are employed as part time in the industry.Nsengiyumva disclosed that the tea farmers are also threatening to leave the cooperative if they are forced to part with any coin. Kazoora said they have no option but to comply with the social security law. Ends
