General Secretary of TUC, Dr Anthony Yaw Baah

Pay top-up lump sum immediately – TUC tells Gov’t

On October 20, 2021, 6:13 AM

The Trades Union Congress (TUC), Ghana, has called on the government to immediately initiate steps to pay the top-up lump sum for workers who retired in 2020, noting that the non-payment has resulted in untold hardships for the retirees.

The Union said it was “regrettable that after more than a year, the government has not paid the top-up lump sum for workers who retired in 2020. The delay is causing severe hardships for the retirees.”

It therefore called on the government, to “as a matter of urgency, to pay the top-up lump-sum for the 2020 retirees and work towards topping up the lump-sum benefits for those who are retiring this year.”

The Union was of the view that retirees were receiving low pension benefits, and said, given the dire state of government finances, a cost-neutral approach should be sought to address the lower pensions for those retiring in 2022 and beyond.

In a proposal to the government ahead of the presentation of the 2022 Budget, TUC has requested for an amendment of Act 766 to postpone the full implementation of the reforms regarding pension benefits, including lump sum benefits, until 2031.

It could be recalled that the President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, in October last year, indicated that the government would absorb the shortfall in the lump sum payment by the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT) to public sector workers that year.

The president stated that he had received a request from TUC for his intervention to ‘correct the injustice and unfairness’ in the implementation of the three-tier pension system’ and resolve the issue of past credit for public sector workers who retired from January 2020.

He noted that the government had decided, after extensive deliberations, to resolve the issue of past credits between the beneficiaries of the PNDC Law 247 and the new three-tier pension scheme to correct the unfairness in the implementation of the new Pension reforms.

Consequently, in November 2020, the then Senior Minister, Mr Yaw Osafo-Maafo (currently, senior presidential advisor), inaugurated a 10-member committee in Accra to resolve the impasse between labour and the government over money paid to retirees this year as pension lump sum.

Nonetheless, the issue, the TUC, has noted was yet to be resolved, hence, the call on the government to urgently pay the Tier-Two top-up lump sum for workers who retired in 2020.

Public debt stock

Touching on the country’s public debt stock, which had ballooned to GH₵332.4 billion after seeing an additional debt of GH₵27.8 billion in April and May 2021, TUC called for a ‘careful’ level of fiscal consolidation.

However, TUC, the national body that unites various workers’ organisations in the country, emphasised that such fiscal consolidation “must be done carefully and in a manner that supports the pace of recovery.

The Union noted that in situations like this, austerity may present itself as an attractive economic policy, but excessive austerity would hurt the economy and create political and social tensions.

This, it said, had been witnessed on the labour front after the government granted a “paltry four percent increase in public sector pay for 2021.”

Some aggrieved public sector workers in August this year, demonstrated to register their displeasure over what they describe as poor conditions of service, and kicked against the 4% and 7% base pay increase proposed by the government for public sector workers for 2021 and 2022 respectively.

Job creation

On job creation, the TUC has asked the government in its 2022 Budget Statement to give every Ghanaian the opportunity to be part of the economic development process through massive job creation in both the public and private sectors of the economy.

“Government should review the various public sector employment programmes, such as the Youth Employment Agency and the Nation Builders Corps, NaBCo, to ensure synergy and eliminate costly duplications, thereby freeing up resources for hiring more young people,” it said.

As part of its proposals, the Union urged the government to engage in deeper consultations and honest discussions with all social partners about the economy, jobs and livelihoods, wages and salaries, debt, and pensions, which outcome should be factored in the 2022 budget process.

Story By Francis Ntow