President Jagdeo’s pension package is not different from his predecessors – OP

TIMES INT'L

The Alliance for Change (AFC) presidential candidate Khemraj Ramjattan has recently contributed to the misinformation being peddled in the media about President Bharrat Jagdeo’s pension.

The Office of the President in a statement on Saturday deemed Ramjattan’s contributions as inaccurate and purposefully misleading.

The statement noted that an examination of the subject and previous publications would show the president’s pension is established at seven-eighths of his salary and has long been so established and remains unchanged.

“It has been given to all former presidents, including all President Jagdeo’s predecessors,” the statement said.

“Ramjattan’s claim that the pension is in excess of Gy$3 million is deliberatively inaccurate. Actually, the pension President Jagdeo will start receiving is about one-third of that amount and is comparable with that received by his immediate predecessor, former President Janet Jagan, with the annual wage increases taken into consideration.” The statement explained that the computation of the president’s pension is based on a formula established in law.

“That same formula is applicable to members of Parliament with designated years of service in Parliament, such as Ramjattan himself.

Further, the salary of a president is on par with that of the chancellor of the Judiciary and the attorney general who sits in Cabinet.

Comparatively, the pension of a president is unlike that of a member of the judiciary whose pension is computed based on twice the actual years of service in the judiciary. The privilege that MPs enjoy in accessing duty-free concession has been abused by Mr. Ramjattan.

He has not used, but sold five such vehicles acquired under the duty-free concession regime during his tenure as a parliamentarian,” the statement noted.

Observers viewed the recent antics by Ramjattan and others, including the publishing of the president’s house in the newspapers, as an invasion of his privacy, and cheap and shameless political gimmickry.

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