End-Of-Service Benefit To Be Retrieved

The current Chief of Staff, Jake Obetsebi Lamptey and the former Chief of Staff, Nana Ato Dadzie are working towards retrieving the End of Service Benefits (ESB) that some ex-government officials received.

Consequently, Mr. Obetsebi-Lamptey has written to the Controller and Accountant General (A-G) to convene a meeting to that effect. Mr. Obetsebi-Lamptey who disclosed this to the Evening News said the A-G has already served him with details of how much the beneficiaries of the ESB have to refund.

He noted that in the interim, he has politely asked Nana Ato Dadzie to inform those requested to make the refunds not to spend all the monies because they are likely to be asked to pay back within a certain period.

The A-G's office which paid the ex-gratia awards has explained that the letter for the payment of the awards was issued from the Ministry of Finance to the Controller and Accountant General which it acted upon without computing the amount for each person.

The A-G said a copy of the letter which, was sent to the A-G's office, should have been sent to the Castle for the computations to be made. A letter was however not sent to the Castle hence the overpayment.

The A-G's office further noted that it was constrained in issuing the cheques because it was the only custodian of government cheques and had no alternative than to issue the cheques. It added that it did not even have an idea about how the cheques were disbursed let alone the calculation

It is recalled that former government officials were over-paid ESB's to the tune of ?2.88 billion while other recipients of the ESB should not have benefited under law. Those who were overpaid are the former President, his vice, ex-presidential staffers, ex-government advisors and secretaries to the ex-President, his vice, ex-cabinet and ex-special duty officers. The rest are directors and district chief executives.