By Victor AhiumaYoung

THE Managing Director of the Nigeria Social Insurance Trust Fund, NSITF, Mr. Oluwaseun Faleye, has vowed to clear all roadblocks hindering an efficient service delivery, saying his vision is to modernize and make the fund capable of seamless delivery of the Employees’ Compensation to the world of work.

Speaking in Abuja while receiving briefings from the various heads of the department of the agency, Mr. Faleye said he would leave no stone unturned in re-positioning the NSITF to be at par with similar agencies in global best practices.

Also at the briefings were the Executive Director of Finance and Investment, Adegoke Adedeji, Executive Director, Administration, Prof. Gabriel Okenwa and the Executive Director of Operations, Mojisolaoluwa Alli-Macaulay.“ General Manager, Corporate Affairs NSITF, Nwachukwu Godson, quoted the Managing Director as saying: “Cardinal on our agenda is to successfully modernize and digitize the processes and procedures of the NSITF to align them with the realities of the time.” 

Assuring that his administration “will clear all the inhibiting factors that currently hinder the digitization of the agency; he asserted that his administration would embark on an ambitious programme to revamp the organization with digitization as key. We must achieve this lofty height without which the NSITF will remain at the backwaters.”

“In achieving this, I’m not going to cut corners or give in to any issue that will derail us. I intend to build a data-driven and customer-centric agency.  I’m going to be very fair to all handling our digitization project. I will look at what has been done and what was proposed, what was approved, and what was delivered. I will look at the capabilities to undertake that project. I will dispassionately assess the situation with the aid of an independent entity so that decisions can be taken in the interest of our organization.

“I wish to leave behind an agency where all services can be initiated and completed on a digital platform and an efficient organization which members of the public can digitally interact with in a manner that enhances transparency and efficiency.

“NSITF needs a holistic approach to digitization in a way that integrates and synchronizes the processes of all departments as units of one whole while achieving a critical handshake with relevant agencies of government as well non-governmental agencies in data-sharing to re-shape the future of the fund.” 

He averred that the functions of the fund’s core service departments are interdependent, noting that “a lag in one affects the other. The more we are able to rehabilitate, return people to work, compensate, reach out to workplaces with health and safety programmes in pursuit of safe environment, the more latitude we grant our Compliance to go on advocacy and register more employers as the reach and the benefits of the ECS will become more evident to employers.”

Faleye, who also promised that the reform of the agency will include overhauling its claims and compensation process to ensure that more injured workers who have genuine claims are rehabilitated, assisted to return to their original employment or taught new skills where they cannot or compensated, pledged to shorten the timeline for the payment of claims.

“My hope is that in days ahead, we bring in more beneficiaries than we currently have. We need to do more by reviewing the claims processes and procedures in a manner that grants a wider access to benefits by injured workers who are registered with the Fund. We need to ramp up our capacity so we can do more.”   

He emphasized the need to undertake more stakeholders’ engagement, especially at the state and local governments, to drive ECS compliance at the sub-national level, noting that the benefits of the ECS are quite relevant to employees at that level of governance.“