Headcount of Pensioners to Begin

The Auditor-General's Department will on Monday begin a headcount of pensioners on Government of Ghana payroll as part of measures to expunge illegal names from it.

All pensioners, who are not members of the Ghana Pensioners' Association in the Greater Accra, are, therefore, to report to the Audit Service Office at the

Central Treasury, Kinbu, with pension letters from their previous places of employment.

A statement issued to the Ghana News Agency in Accra and signed by Mr John Lartey, Deputy Auditor-General, said the exercise would enable the pensioners to fill necessary pension headcount forms.

It said members of the Ghana Government Pensioners' Association in the Greater Accra Region would be provided with the forms on their meeting days at

their respective zones on production of their pension identity cards.

The statement urged pensioners to comply with the directive to avoid their names being struck out from the payroll.

It noted that "ghost names" on government pension payrolls had become a major financial drain on the country, especially in the three northern regions

due to the high level of illiteracy.

"Most often a pensioner dies and his next of kin takes over to collect pensions, due to the fact that these forms are only thumbprints," he said.

The statements said about 100,000 peoples were on the government's pension payroll.

The government had said some 300 billion cedis was siphoned from the state coffers a year through "ghost names" and therefore embarked on an exercise

to plug the holes that had created the avenues for some officials to insert "ghost names" on payrolls.