The opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP), has plans to review the period before retirement for recruits, popularly referred to as “other ranks” in the Ghana Armed Forces, should they return to office after the December elections.
Currently, the recruits retire after 25 years, but the NPP believes a review is needed to give them more opportunities in the Ghana Armed Forces (GAF).
The Chairman of the party’s sub-committee on Defense and Interior, and MP for Bimbila, Dominic Nitiwul, earlier spoke to journalists on the review, and indicated the NPP’s intent to extend the period before retirement by five years.
Mr. Nitiwul said, “we believe that the men and women of the Ghana Armed Forces will not be focused more on combat any longer. They will be more focused on terrorism, cyber-crime, helping the people, engaging in things that will support the nation as well as defend the territorial integrity of this nation.”
“The convention of allowing our men to retire after serving 25 years particularly the other ranks, we will be reviewing it to look at the possibility of adding five more years. That means that, unless you want to retire voluntarily, you would have the opportunity to retire after 30 years in the force,” he added.
Mr. Nitiwul explained that, this proposal is in the name of equity explaining that, “if a civil servant is allowed to retire at 60 years, you don’t ask somebody in the army to retire at 45 years if he enters at 20 years and then he goes home and has nothing to do.”
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