Grand National Party lawmaker Son Sook-mee of the National Assembly’s Health, Welfare and Family Affairs Committee said on Sunday, “The National Pension Service has invested $1.93 billion in emerging markets since August 27th of last year, only to sustain a loss of about $451 million, thus recording a 23.4 percent of loss rate as of late September this year.

“NPS invested most stock, amounting to $335 million, in Brazil, losing some 27 percent, or $91 million.”

“The NPS has commissioned such asset management companies as AIG and Morgan Stanley to invest in overseas bonds and stocks. Although $1.98 million was paid as commission, they never made a profit over a one-year period,” Son added.

Another GNP lawmaker, Won Hee-mok, of the Committee revealed, “According to data submitted by the NPS, of those eligible for the national pension between 1989 and late May of this year, 6,317 people did not benefit from the scheme, as they did not claim. The sum of their contributions amounted to W31.1 billion (US$1=W1,290) -- about W4.92 million each.”

The NPS also came in for criticism by GNP lawmaker Lee Ae-joo, who said, “Until this August, the NPS wrongfully provided W110 billion of pension benefits to people whose pensions should have expired, of which as much as W12.6 billion has not been recouped.”

Lawmaker Lim Doo-sung, of the same party, explained, “For the months through to July of this year, some 304,000 enterprises fell behind on their contributions to the national pension scheme, bringing total arrears to W1,281 billion.

“The number of delinquent companies has been increasing steeply from 223,000 (W1,030 billion) in 2005 to 259,000 (W1,145 billion) in 2006 to 284,000 (W1,230 billion) in 2007, due to their financial difficulties,” he added.

(englishnews@chosun.com )