A special interest group advancing the welfare of government employees from around the country is appalled that state-owned Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) has allegedly chosen to be opaque on its investment activities and has played the deaf ear on their repeated requests for greater clarity on the matter.
This was learned from the Confederation of Government Employees Organizations Inc. (Cogeo) and the National Association of Lawyers for Justice and Peace (NALJP) represented in this case by Jesus I. Santos, himself a lawyer.
According to Santos, the two organizations have since asked the GSIS to account for the $800 million worth of pension funds deployed in overseas markets ostensibly for the benefit and welfare of millions of GSIS members but that their pleadings allegedly have been largely ignored.
He also said he has written the then-officer in charge of the Office of the President and General Manager at the fund a letter for the group to be informed on the financial standing of GSIS funds and assets, copies of the board resolution, investments and expenses of then-GSIS President and General Manager Robert Vergara, as well as explain why the provident funds of the late former GSIS trustee Alejandro Roces and that of his
own were denied them.
Santos has deplored the continued GSIS refusal to release the provident fund benefits earned when both were GSIS trustees under Vergara.
“We worked as trustees at the GSIS and earned the benefits that continues to be denied us at present,” he complained.
He would also dwell on the matter of the sale of the 18-story Philcomcen building along Ortigas Avenue, that the GSIS sold under bidding conditions to the Gotianuns of Filinvest for some P772 million as part of the pension fund’s asset disposal program.
Then-GSIS OIC President and General Manager Nora Malubay-Saludares would subsequently tell Santos in a letter that the investment decision of the GSIS board of trustees and management he has sought are subject to so-called disclosure guidelines under Board Resolution 241 on November 24, 2011, that vested those decisions a level of secrecy categorized as Highly Classified Information that may not be shared so openly
with anyone.
Such commercially sensitive transactions, Saludares claimed, have very limited disclosure range.
Still, Santos lament that the GSIS, given the nature and origin of its funds, owe their members and special interest groups as the Cogeo and NALJP, greater transparency on their investment decisions.