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Municipal Pension Fund: Can the fox guard the henhouse? Image: gentileza
🇵🇾 Paraguay /Economy & Trade

Municipal Pension Fund: Can the fox guard the henhouse?

From ABC Color · () Spanish

Translated from Spanish and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

Analysis Named sources Under investigation
  • Paraguay’s pension regulator handed the Municipal Employees’ Pension Fund an institutional compliance plan while the fund remains in technical bankruptcy.
  • ABC Color noted that the plan went to the same administration facing allegations of mismanagement, an alleged major embezzlement and improperly collected fees.
  • The plan covers administrative controls, financial recovery and institutional sustainability, but the board has not announced a date for long-delayed elections.

Paraguay’s pension regulator has delivered an institutional compliance plan to the administration of the Municipal Employees’ Pension Fund, even though that same team has kept the institution in technical bankruptcy for years. ABC Color frames the arrangement with a pointed question: “Can the fox guard the henhouse?”

Superintendent of Pensions Griselda Mariel Figueredo de Giménez formally handed the plan to the fund’s board. The board is chaired by Venancio Díaz Escobar, who is facing prosecution for breach of trust. The plan establishes mandatory measures for the institution’s adjustment and strengthening.

The fund’s financial crisis has been linked in the article to poor administrative management and municipalities’ failure to transfer funds. Bernabé Peralta, who resigned as president in January 2024, and Díaz Escobar, who replaced him from the same political team, are both under investigation over an alleged multimillion-dollar embezzlement and alleged improper fee collection.

Some board members are also facing criticism as legal maneuvers have delayed elections to renew the leadership since October 2024. The adjustment plan has three phases: administrative, operational and institutional control; financial organization, liquidity management and stronger revenue; and institutional sustainability. The fund said all three phases have already begun.

The first phase contains 15 measures, including renewal of the board. Current board members said they had held two meetings on institutional strengthening, but no date has been announced for new elections. That omission remains one of the strongest complaints from retirees, who, according to the truncated account, have not been receiving their pension payments.

Can the fox guard the henhouse?

— ABC ColorThe publication questioned whether the administration responsible for the fund’s crisis should oversee its recovery plan.
About this summary

Originally published by ABC Color in Spanish. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

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