ISLAMABAD: Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb said on Tuesday it was vital to reform the country’s pension system, including by raising the retirement aged.
“Age is just a number,” Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb said at a press conference in Islamabad.
“Sixty is the new 40. In the [private sector] institution I left before coming here [as finance minister], we raised the retirement age from 60 to 65. These are your most productive years when you have maximum experience.”
He recognized that changes to the service structure could not be carried out overnight but said Pakistan would need to move in this direction to control the pension costs.
Law Minister Azam Nazir Tarar said pension reforms would be held across the board, for which legislation was required.
He said that political and economic stability were interconnected, adding that the Parliament should also adopt the pension reforms unanimously.
The Parliament, he said, had introduced first legislation with regard to tax collection. Now it was an internationally admitted fact that only a country with economic stability would progress, he added.
The minister said that a committee had been formed on pension reforms which would view the different proposals regarding it.
He said that the pension reforms would be implemented in every government institution across the board.
Nothing was going on under the carpet, he said, adding that the decisions would be shared with the public.
