A former Member of Parliament for Bolgatanga Constituency, David Apasara, has defended the joint decision by some MPs to sue government over pensions owed them.
David Apasara and thirty-nine other former MPs under the erstwhile Kufuor administration, have sued the Attorney-General and the Ministry of Finance over the issue, demanding at least GHc 233,495 each as pension.
Among the plaintiffs are the Senior Minister in the Nana Akufo-Addo administration, Yaw Osafo-Maafo, the acting New Patriotic Party (NPP) Chairman, Freddie Blay and Kwamena Bartels.
Speaking on Eyewitness News, Mr. Apasara said the suit is justifiable since they had served the nation and should therefore be rewarded.
“We have served the nation…A committee of five persons under Chinery Hessey went into the matter and told us the amount that will be paid us if we serve two consecutive terms and we have served two consecutive terms, we have served the nation and we therefore qualify for pension. We are not being inconsiderate. We are claiming what is legitimate.”
Mr. Apasara said the demands are not borne out of a desire to make wealth wrongly, saying “Some of us really worked for the state at a very early stage . I started as a revolutionary cadre and my aim was not to make wealth for myself. I was thinking about how to serve the nation and that is why I got into revolutionary politics so not everyone is thinking of getting something through politics.”
He clarified that their demands have become extremely necessary since some MPs are currently not receiving pension from any source.
“We are not paid anything as pension. We might have been making contributions to SSNIT, but not all of us had the opportunity of serving in areas where we would have pension to ourselves.”
The initial lump sum was said to be GHc 13,735 per plaintiff, but interest accrued on the amount from January 2009 to February 2016 raises the amount to GHc 233,495.
That would mean government would have to give out almost GHc 10 million to settle the former MPs. The plaintiff’s claim is anchored on one of the recommendations by the Chinery-Hesse Committee Report, which says that persons who exited Parliament, having served two full term periods and are above 50 years, should be paid some sums of money as pension benefits.
Among the other reliefs, the disgruntled former MPs are also praying the court refund their legal bills. The former MPs have since 2011 been negotiating with government regarding the pensions, but the attempts to have their demands met have not yielded results.
Find below the list of former MPs
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(Via: CitiFM Online Ghana)
