A repeal of the Former President’s (Benefits and Other Facilities) Act 2009 will not affect the basic pension of former president Bharrat Jagdeo, AFC Chairman, Khemraj Ramjattan has emphasized.
Presidential Advisor Gail Teixeira told Stabroek News last week that repealing the act will have consequences for other constitutional post-holders. Noting that the issue is “extremely complex,” she said that “you cannot take away people’s pension rights.” The presidential advisor added that pensions for constitutional post-holders such as the President, Speaker of the National Assembly and others are tied to an index first started by the late president Forbes Burnham in the 1970s and added to by the PPP.
The main opposition, APNU wants to amend the controversial Former President’s (Benefits and Other Facilities) Act 2009, while the AFC wants to repeal the act but is prepared to discuss its amendment with APNU. Ramjattan told Stabroek News on Sunday that the AFC has not yet met APNU on this and he is awaiting the outcome of an APNU motion on the act which is due to be debated at the next sitting of the National Assembly on Wednesday. The AFC Chairman has drafted legislation to repeal the act and signalled that he would likely table it after the APNU motion is debated.
Teixeira said last week that the opposition is being reckless and irresponsible and if they went ahead with a repeal of the act “everything that is indexed will come tumbling down.” She said that it will have “consequences for other constitutional post-holders that are indexed.”
However, Ramjattan said on Sunday that the former president’s pension is covered in the Pensions (President) Act 2004 and “we are not doing anything with that.” He said that the pension of the former president is covered under that act and currently it would amount to about $1 million per month or 7/8 of the monthly salary of a sitting president.
A repeal of the Former President’s (Benefits and Other Facilities) Act 2009 would not affect a former president’s pension, he stressed. A repeal of the Former President’s (Benefits and Other Facilities) Act 2009 would also not affect any other act, he continued and would affect only the former president since other office holders do not have such benefits.
Ramjattan said that the 2009 Act adds about $2 million in services to the pension and it is a sum that they believe is exorbitant and want revised. “Only the president now would get all these other benefits,” he said and questioned why other constitutional post-holders are not accorded similar benefits. “Why did he [former president Bharrat Jagdeo] go and make one law for himself?” he asked.
The AFC Chairman said that once the motion is passed, the National Assembly can set up a committee that can deal with the issue in a “more reasonable fashion.”
