General News of Monday, 16 January 2017

Source: GNA

Investigate second tier pension scheme - TEWU

File photo: Teachers and Educational Workers Union File photo: Teachers and Educational Workers Union

The Teachers and Educational Workers Union (TEWU) of the Trades Union Congress (TUC) has appealed to government to investigate the why workers five percent contribution towards the second tier pension scheme had not been released.

According to TEWU since the scheme started in 2010 the previous government had delayed in releasing the fund, believing that such an investigation will facilitate the speedy release to managers of the second tier pension scheme.

Speaking to the Ghana News Agency during an interview in Accra on Monday, Mr. Augustine Saakuur Karbu, General Secretary of TEWU, said should the funds be released, it would enable the scheme managers to invest the money so that it would yield dividends for the members when they retire.

Mr Saakuur Karbu said, "the temporal pension fund account in Bank of Ghana into which workers contribution were being deposited is generating some interest so we want the government to facilitate the release of these monies with the interest calculated and disbursed to various union fund managers to enable them to operate”.

Stakeholders and unions under TUC found that the services rendered by Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT) were not the best, so a move was made by them to reform SSNIT as the sole operator of pension scheme in Ghana, which led to deregulation of SSNIT resulting from the establishment of the first, second, and third tier pension scheme.