By Naa Shormei Odonkor
Koforidua, Dec. 5, GNA – Mr. Yaw Ofori Debrah, a retiree, has appealed to the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT) to increase the yearly bonus paid to pensioners as a shield against the country’s deteriorating economic situation.
According to him, SSNIT generally offered its pension beneficiaries a bonus increment of roughly nine to ten percent of their contributed fund at the start of each year, but the country’s present economic situation necessitated an increase in the amount.
Mr. Debrah told the Ghana News Agency in an interview that “a lot of people on SSNIT pension fall within the range of Gh¢300 to Gh¢2000 and you could imagine what they face in this time of escalating economic hardship.”
He noted that retirees were financially constrained because many of them, mainly in their advanced age, had to rely on taxis for mobility or would always have to go with aid, access to medication, and then food.
“So, just like the government supported public workers in this economic crisis with the Cost-of-Living Allowance (COLA), he said.
He added: “The SSNIT must replicate such an act.
“Give pensioners some kind of top up to cope with the financial circumstances of the day before the year ends to support mobility and medication of the aged and weak pensioners.”
Mr Debrah also said that pensioners were entitled to these perks because their monies contributed to the SSNIT investments, and they must reap the benefits.
“Our monies are still in investment, and they give us part of it every month. It means our money is supporting the course of SSNIT investment.
So, so long as they get yields of the investment, they should give us something higher on the yields of the investment our money has been giving us,” he said.
The SSNIT is a statutory body established under the National Pensioners Act 2008 Act 766 to handle the first tier of the three-tiered pension scheme.
GNA