This simple practice will make you wealthy

“Over 98% of NSSF beneficiaries spend their benefits within two years, often using funds for immediate needs.”

Have you ever seen a statistic that is so alarming, but at the same time does not surprise you? This one is one of those, for me. There is also the one about absentee fathers in Uganda—but let us save that for another day, when I will boldly and robustly (Christianese for “violently”) attack it in my own time.

For now, let me passive-aggressively go at your lifestyle of hanging out every weekend, eating out three times a week at expensive restaurants (for example, why are you eating chips worth 50K?), going to Mombasa twice a year, drinking expensive liquor, renting an apartment at 700K with your salary of UGX 1.2M… I know, I know, “Your money, your choice.”

Yes, but all of this without a single penny in savings to your name? Tell me why you think that that statistic is not referring to you and 9 of your friends? Because 98% means that in every group of 10 (which could be any day at your hangout with your 9 drinking buddies) almost all of you will be completely broke within two years of your retirement.

Okay, let me stop twisting that knife that I have already dug too deep between your left ribs and go back to our statistic. Let us dissect it (instead of your now big feelings) properly. That statistic tells a complete story. Let us go into it:

98% — means almost all of them.

OF NSSF BENEFICIARIES — means that these were not even voluntary savings, but the kind mandated by the government. In other words, these are savings that people were forced to make, and the government kept for them.

SPEND THEIR BENEFITS — not save or invest, but spend. This is what they would do, of course. They have not been living a lifestyle of saving and investing. How could they magically develop it at the point of their retirement?

WITHIN TWO YEARS — this is telling. If it were a little money, it would have been spent in a shorter time. But “within two years” implies a large sum of tens to hundreds of millions.

OFTEN USING FUNDS FOR IMMEDIATE NEEDS — this means food, clothing, entertainment, tuition, and our favourite: building a house.

Be honest with yourself: if you continue with your life on this trajectory, can you honestly say that you will be different from this 98% when we retire in the next 30 years?

Thankfully, there is a solution. I said it last week, but let me repeat it again here: If you set aside UGX 100,000 every month in an account that accrues compound interest at a rate of about 10% (the range is 9%–12%), you will have approximately UGX 251,869,000 by the time you retire.

You would have this alongside your retirement benefits. And because you understand the accounts through which money grows, when your NSSF/Pension benefits come, you would put both them and this 251,869,000 in an account that accrues 10% interest.

This interest would be paid to you either once a year as a bulk 25,186,900 or twice a year as two half-year payments of 12,593,450 each -enough for you to comfortably or modestly live off of, depending on your lifestyle. This is even before we touch your NSSF/Pension benefits. Assuming that they are the same amount as your voluntary savings, we would be talking of approximately 25,186,900 twice a year.

The best part is, you could withdraw a part of your principal (the bulk 251,869,000), build that big house retired folks love to build, and still have a lot left over, and still earning interest. This money would be virtually infinite.

For someone who did not receive a financial inheritance from their parents, you would be the first to do so in your lineage -which God commands us to do, by the way, not just for our children but for our children’s children too (Proverbs 13:22).

Meanwhile, these things are taught at church, but you do not vibe with God like that, neither with His children nor His structures designed for you to grow holistically because, you know, “colonial religion” and whatnot, so… But in case you want to consider it, here is a poster of the sermon series on finances that Mavuno Church is doing this month. If you really want to, you will go to YouTube and look for the sermons.