..for not paying employees contributions

Ho, Sept 11, GNA - A Branch Manager of the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT) has slammed district assemblies for wilfully delaying paying social security contributions of their employees on manual vouchers to the Trust.

Mr Joy Charles Abbey, Manager at Denu in the Volta Region, was speaking during an interaction with journalists in Ho as part the SSNIT's 2005 consultative outreach programme to collate views and complaints to improve the Trust's operations.

He said rather than seek the interest of their employees in their dealings with the SSNIT, the assemblies "adopt all kinds of tricks" to enable them escape paying the deductions to SSNIT.

Mr Abbey, who said he had had to secure a court order recently to seize a vehicle of the Akatsi District Assembly in lieu of unpaid deductions, said district assemblies should serve as examples for small firms in the rural areas.

He said SSNIT was now adopting aggressive methods to get recalcitrant clients, including the assemblies, to conform to obligations owed their employees under the laws establishing SSNIT. Mr Kwaku Osei-Bimpong, Head of Public Affairs Department of SSNIT, said senior managers often take issues of SSNIT for granted. "They will unwillingly release their workers for seminars with SSNIT and remain at their desks when many of them, the managers, have issues with regard to data on their nomination forms to be resolved," he said. 11 Sept 05