KUALA LUMPUR: Out of the RM12 million in monthly pension payments made to dead army veterans, as mentioned in the Auditor-General’s Report on Monday, only RM3 million has yet to be recovered from the beneficiaries, says the Armed Forces Veterans Affairs Department.
Director-general Major General Datuk Mohd Noor Daud said the remaining RM9 million had either been recovered from the dead veterans’ families or adjustments had been made to revert the payment to eligible beneficiaries.
“Based on our records, the amount paid to the 3,000 dead veterans between 2011 and 2013 is RM11,953,447.60. However, not all should be recovered.
“Part of this amount is to be paid back to the rightful beneficiaries while some will have to be collected from non-eligible beneficiaries,” he said.
The report revealed that the millions in monthly pensions were paid to 3,786 dead veterans or recipients of retirement benefits. Of that, a total of RM1.69 million has been recovered.
Mohd Noor said the RM1.69 million, or 14.2%, mentioned in the report in its “Successfully Recovered” category referred to the amount that was returned by the banks from the accounts of the dead army veterans.
He explained that when an army personnel is pronounced dead, the pension payment would be redirected to his wife or other eligible beneficiaries.
He said out of the 3,786 dead pensioners mentioned in the report, 2,845 beneficiaries were eligible to receive the payments. Only 941 beneficiaries were not eligible.
“We have made the necessary adjustments to reflect this,” he said.
“As for the 941 non-eligible beneficiaries, the department is in the process of recovering the pensions and have issued letters of demand to them. So far, we have managed to get back a total of RM977,729.17 from 303 beneficiaries.”
Based on the latest calculations, Mohd Noor said the department only needs to collect RM2,884,941,055.64 from the remaining 638 non-eligible beneficiaries. — The Malaysian Insider
This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily, on November 14, 2014.