Former chief magistrate Juliet Holder-Allen said the computation of her retirement benefits is flawed and thus she has rejected the final settlement offered by the Ministry of Finance.
Talks between her and a ministry official broke down on Friday last, according to Holder-Allen, after she objected to the method of computation. She said the official attending to her matter gave her “some convoluted explanation as to what he was doing…instead of additions and multiplications that are used to compute benefits the official was using only subtractions”.
Stabroek News tried but was unable to locate the official at the Ministry of Finance who is dealing with the ex-chief magistrate’s benefits for comment.
In a statement issued to the press on Sunday, Holder-Allen, said the official pulled a figure of $6M from somewhere and after subtracting had arrived at a final figure for her gratuity and pension, which she referred to as disrespectful and pathetic. The final figure was not mentioned but according to her, it is the most barefaced case of larceny of her personal property.
Holder-Allen claimed that her record of service which she had protested for from the Judicial Service Commission (JSC) and obtained, and which assists the ministry in computing the benefits, has gone missing from the Treasury Department of the Finance Ministry where the final payments are to be made.
Stabroek News was also unable to verify whether the record of service has disappeared from the Treasury Department, as efforts to contact an official proved futile.
However, Chancellor of the Judiciary (ag) Justice Carl Singh briefly commented on the issue when contacted yesterday. He said the JSC had been responsible for preparing Holder-Allen’s record of service, which was passed to the Ministry of Finance. Justice Singh said the JSC has no further role to play with respect to the benefits as it was “entirely out of our hands now”.
The former chief magistrate stated that the final benefits must be computed based on her years of service, positions held and salaries paid to her in those positions. But a well-placed source in the judiciary told Stabroek News yesterday that the benefits are calculated based on the years of service and the last salary Holder-Allen would have earned.
Holder-Allen alleged in her statement that something sinister is unfolding since it appears that her benefits after years of contribution to the judiciary are in danger of being taken away.
Earlier this month Holder-Allen and a few supporters staged a protest outside the Court Appeal over the delay of benefits being issued to her; her record of service had not been prepared at the time.
Holder-Allen resigned on September 2 this year after nearly five years of being on indefinite leave over allegations of misconduct.