PERFORMANCE ASSESSMENT OF THE DEFINED CONTRIBUTORY PENSION SCHEME: A STUDY OF FEDERAL GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES IN SOKOTO STATE

The Defined Contributory Pension Scheme also known as the New Contributory Pension Scheme was introduced in 2004 mainly to bring succor to employees in both the public and private sectors access to their pension benefits with ease. Unlike what obtains in the previous pension plans associated with severing consequence of failure necessitated the birth of the Defined Contributory Pension in Nigeria. Yet the plan did not go unnoticed with complaints such as employees opening retirement savings account (RSA) or the temporary retirement savings account (TRSA), awareness of interest or commission accruable to pension assets, notification of pension monthly contribution as and when due as well as the accessibility to pension assets. These are the problems the study seeks to find answers to. The study major objective through the stated instrumentality was to find out the level of the policy effectiveness. The study used primary data generated from Federal government employees and retirees in Sokoto state through the administration of a closed ended structured questionnaire. ANOVA and Spearman Correlation were used to test the hypotheses with the aid of Stata and SPSS. The study found that there is no significant difference between the opinions of serving employees and retirees in terms of opening of Retirement Savings Account or Temporary Retirement Savings Account, that there is a significant relationship between employees and retirees in the Ministries, Departments and Agencies in terms of awareness of interest or commission accruable to pension assets, that serving employees and retirees in the Ministries, Departments and Agencies have difference in opinion in terms of receipt of notification of pension monthly contributions and remittances as and when due, and that there was a significant difference between serving employees and retirees in terms of accessibility of pension benefits after retirement. On the basis of the foregoing findings, the major conclusion drawn from this study is that the defined contributory pension scheme has performed credibly since its inception and that when adequately allowed functioning will be effective to achieve the essence for which it is enacted.