CPF gets approval to administer Civil Service Pensions

By Monica MUEMA

CPF Financial Services will proceed to administer the Public Service Superannuation Fund (PSSF) after the Court of Appeal on Wednesday directed the fund’s Board of Trustees to honor a contract that the company had won within 30 days.

The financial services firm which is the administrator of the County Pension Fund (CPF) and the Local Authorities Pension Trust (LAPTRUST) had successfully bid for the civil service pensions contract following a competitive tendering process advertised in June last year, interesting several firms.

The ruling by a three-bench Court of Appeal judges will now see CPF Financial Services become a one-stop shop for all pension needs for both County Government employees as well as National Government civil servants.

“CPF was the only bidder who managed to get to the financial proposals opening stage after attaining a technical score of 95.2 percent. The court victory is a testament to what the firm has managed to achieve in less than five years, to stand at over Sh1.4 billion. We have also managed to grow the fund value of the various pension funds under our portfolio by more than 300 percent since 2013,” offered CPF’s Chief executive Hosea Kili.

The matter had been challenged before the Public Procurement and Administrative Review Board and later the High Court, where the PBARB was directed to complete the process.

The fund’s trustees had opposed the case arguing that once the tender validity period expired, it could not be resuscitated, owing to what they (trustees) argued that the tender period lapsed on January 11, 2022.

“To bring finality in this matter, we are of the considered view that the interests of justice would be best served if we order, as we hereby do, that the appellant (Board of Trustees) do issue the 1st respondent (CPF) with the appropriate notification letter within 30 days from the date hereof,” Justices Daniel Musinga, Luka Kimaru and Ngenye Macharia said.

This comes even as the company is forecasting higher growth margins for the year, casting buoyancy on a rebounding investor confidence that had been disadvantaged from the economic fallout in the just determined general elections and the Russia-Ukraine war.

It is targeting net earnings of Sh32 billion for the year 2022, up from Sh27.97 billion it posted last year. The firm returned a Sh19.49 billion in revenue for the year ended December 2020.

The Group’s Director for finance, strategy and Investments, Joseph Rono, in an interview said the company will seek to diversify its investments to boost this year’s performance having invested in other assets likely not to be affected by the depreciating value of Shilling such as offshore vehicles and unquoted equities.

During the period under review, the firm’s Laptrust DB Scheme fund value grew to Sh31.8 billion, from Sh31.3 billion in the previous year, a 1.6 percent growth last year. Similarly, Salih, a segregated fund within the County Pension Fund, grew by Sh3.28 billion last year up from Sh2.3 billion in the year earlier.

“Because of the challenges we experienced at the beginning of year, we are projecting to see the inflation concerns still linger, though we are beginning to see some policies being signed in the hope to reverse those concerns,” he said.