My designation as Minister for Pensions not new – Employment minister

The Minister for Employment and Labour Relations, Ignatius Baffour-Awuah, has clarified issues surrounding his designation as Minister for Pensions.

According to him, the pensions minister role is something that has existed and is not a new creation of the Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo government, citinewsroom.com reports.

He added that he is still the employment minister and is just taking on additional roles as the pensions minister-designate.

“I appeared before the [Public Accounts] committee and the chairman asked me which minister is responsible for SSNIT and I read the letter to him. So, it’s not any new thing.

“I still remain the Minister for Employment except that I have additional responsibility with oversight of pensions. That’s the simple terms of reference to see over SSNIT and National Pensions Regulatory Authority as my agencies for policy directives,” the minister is quoted to have said on Citi News.

The minister further explained that the role was previously played by the Minister of Finance Ken Ofori-Atta.

“The law says that the President has to designate a specific Minister for pensions. So that is what he has exactly done just that to a greater extent, I was playing that particular role, but I had not been officially designated as Minister responsible.

“It’s just been more official. To be very honest, hitherto, it was under the Minister of Finance. So, I am surprised by the publications because this was just to clear a point by the Committee,” he said.

The minister’s disclosure that he was the minister-designate for pensions met some public outcry.

The new responsibility has been widely opposed by the minority caucus in Parliament.

They believe that the decision is untenable in the face of current economic challenges with Ghana seeking IMF assistance.

IB/SARA