Double salaries saga: Here's how much MPs who are ministers take as allowances

• A Minister of State and Member of Parliament in the current administration has spoken to GhanaWeb on condition of anonymity

• He denied the claims that as MPs who are appointed as ministers, they earn double salaries

• He disclosed that the allowances they receive as ministers is in the range of GH¢3000

A Minister of State who also doubles as a Member of Parliament has waded into the debate on whether or not they take double salaries for serving in such double capacities.

Speaking to GhanaWeb on condition of anonymity, the MP and Minister explained that truly, there is nothing like double salaries because the arrangement is that as ministers who are already in Parliament, they are only entitled to some allowances for doing the jobs they do.

He explained that these allowances, within the range of GH¢3000, are the same for all ministers in the same category, irrespective of the sector, making it a purely sacrificial part of their job.

There have been renewed discussions in the probability that MPs who serve in separate capacities as ministers actually withdraw double salaries (one from each portfolio) follow the recent epistle of the former Special Prosecutor, Martin Amidu.

In his epistle titled, "The MPs double salary criminal investigation docket was handled by the Attorney-General and never by Martin Amidu," he explained that while it was alleged that he was involved in such a case, it never come to his table.

"Throughout my tenure as the Special Prosecutor, the respected former Attorney General, Ms. Gloria Akuffo, never referred this case to me for further investigation or prosecution. Any experienced and ethical person who has ever occupied the office of Deputy Minister of Justice under the Constitution knows that the Attorney General never sends a docket to another independent investigatory or prosecutorial agency without a covering letter forwarding the docket with requisite instructions or requests," he wrote.

He then went on to accuse the president, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, of usurping the authority of the Attorney-General and determines criminal prosecutions.

"The credible information I received on the case is and was that the then-Attorney General and the Director of Public Prosecutions had both perused the case docket and had come to the conclusion that charges be filed against some of the suspects for prosecution. The Attorney General was instructed not to do so by the President who unconstitutionally usurped the investigatory and prosecutorial constitutional authority of the Attorney General on grounds of political expediency of having the suspects agreeable to play ball in Parliament for the Government," he wrote.