Pride making Finance Minister from responding to Pensioneers-Fmr Chief Justice

Former Chief Justice, Madam Sophia Akuffu has taken a swipe at the finance minister, Ken Ofori-Atta for refusing to listen to calls to back down on the decision to include pensioners from the domestic debt exchange program. According to her, only pride can prevent Ken Ofori-Atta from responding to the ntensionerbondholders' forum. Apart from pride, what else is stopping the Minister of Finance, Ken Ofori-Atta from responding to pensioner bondholders in writing on the status of their government bonds about their call for an exemption in the Domestic Debt Exchange Programme (DDEP), the immediate past chief Justice, Sophia Akuffo has questioned. To her, the pensioner bondholders have written to the Finance Ministry, asking for a total exemption from the government’s Domestic Debt Exchange Programme (DDEP) but as of now, they have not even received a note acknowledging receipt of their letter or response writing. She questioned why other groups wrote letters to the Finance Ministry on a similar issue after the pensioners had sent theirs, but those groups have received responses and yet the pensioners were to hear from the minister in writing. “It will be better for all of us and the nation too that, he [Finance Minister] responds to the letter that we sent him.” It is their [Pensioner Bondholders] argument that the government must officially write to exempt them from the DDEP Leaders of Individual Bondholders Forum They insist the sector Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta must follow this up with a public announcement that they have been exempted. Without that, they intend to continue protesting and meet the leadership of Parliament on Thursday until their issue is resolved. Speaking to journalists on Tuesday in Accra, where the immediate past Chief Justice Sophia Akuffo had joined other Pensioners for the protest, they called for fair play as they claim they are being sacrificed for the lot. Asked for a comment on whether there was mistrust for the government and that is why she [Sophia Akuffo] is still joining the protest even though the government has said maturing coupons will be paid, Justice Akuffo said, “paper talks, paper talks, empty talks fly with the wind.” “So we are waiting when they become due we shall see, it will be better than for all of us and for people who have served the nation…” Justice Sophia Akuffo said the pensioner bondholders chose not to sign unto the DDEP but, “now the way things are going, what I sense and what I smell is the creation of two categories of people, of two classes of people, those who have been exempted by the issuer… now they are calling those who refused to sign unto the debt exchange, they are calling them self exempt, they simply refused to sign and they simply want to sign unto the original bond that they had with the government.” “The word bond is not used as a casual term, bond means tied to [my word is my bond], and when a government bond can be tossed up and down like that, flip flop, that is a serious thing. For me, my problem with this whole thing is the destruction of the image of this nation and something which is being done for generations.” “It took a long time before the normal Ghanaian will even buy anything that is the government because there was always the suspicion, tomorrow, you don’t know what happen. Now they are re-introducing that. The letter that was written to the minister, exempts us from your programme, we are pensioners. Up till now, I have seen a copy of the letter, there is not even a note of acknowledgment and yet a few days ago, similar letters written to the Minister have been responded to, whereby he has categorically exempted other groups, why?” “And you know what, I cannot fathom the reason for something being done in a particular way, especially when it's been done for others but is not being done for others, I start getting suspicious, I have grown to the age where I have seen it all, and therefore I easily become suspicious.”