In an interesting twist to the NAGRAT strike, the Ghanaian Palaver has discovered that the Government has already started spending the pension money of public workers that is currently held in accounts at the Bank of Ghana.
A source at the Bank of Ghana disclosed to the Ghanaian Palaver on the basis of anonymity intimated that various amounts of the public workers’ pensions held by the Bank had been released to the Government in the last few weeks.
Meanwhile, Government and the public unions are unable to agree as to who should manage the tier-two pensions of the public workers. Under the law, the employer is permitted to allow a pension fund to manage its tier-two pension. NAGRAT for instance, in the latter part of 2013, insisted that GES should manage its tier-two pension fund.
However, it is widely believed that the Government intends to handover the management of the tier-two pensions of public workers to Pensions Alliance Trust, a company owned by Ato Ahwoi, a senior adviser to President Mahama.
Having received an overwhelming backlash from Ghanaians regarding the use of the Heritage Fund to solve our current problems, the Government has dipped its fingers into the pot of public workers pensions even before it allocates its management to Ato Ahwoi’s company.
Once all pensions of public workers are managed by a top NDC official’s company, the Government will have easy access to use the monies, which will never run out since public workers are always working and would always pay their pensions. Moreover, the NDC can continue to hoard monies belonging to Ghanaians as part of their war chest for their primaries and election 2016.
Officials at the Ministry of Finance and the Bank of Ghana refused to comment on the Government’s unauthorized use of the pensions of public workers.