Haruna Iddrisu, Nii Laryea Afotey Agbo, Alban Bagbin and Emmanuel Armah Kofi-Buah
It has emerged that about 48 Members of Parliament (MPs), who served as ministers under the previous National Democratic Congress (NDC) administration, are said to have received double salaries.
They are being investigated by the Criminal Investigations Department (CID) of the Ghana Police Service.
Interestingly, those who are very vocal are not part of the ‘double taker’ salary ministers.
Earlier report suggested that 25 MPs had been invited by the police.
Documents available to DAILY GUIDE indicate that about 48 former NDC appointees were involved, with some of them admitting taking double salaries.
The police said the alleged action by the MPs “is contrary to Section 124 (1) of the Criminal and other Offence Act 1960 (Act 29) as amended in 2012, Act 849. Section 124 relates to the offence of stealing.”
A list sighted by DAILY GUIDE showed that a good number of the ministers, who served under former President John Mahama, took double salaries for four years, whilst others received double salaries for two and three years, probably because they were reshuffled.
In 2012, four of ministers took double salaries, and are currently not serving in parliament, but by 2013 the double salaried appointees had increased to 22 while in 2014 about 18 were said to be involved.
For 2015 and 2016, 15 and 12 appointtees took double salaries respectively.
From 2012 to 2016 when the NDC was booted out of office, some of the appointees were captured in all the data collated as having received double salaries.
This list showed that the appointees received double salaries at least once a month, whilst others received them monthly throughout the years.
On Thursday, the CID said that it had not suspended any investigations into allegations.
That response followed a claim by the minority MPs that the CID boss had embarrassed them by inviting them over the issue.
A communication issued by the CID indicated that some NDC MPs, who were invited over the allegations, would again be summoned by the CID for questioning.
Initially, 25 NDC MPs were said to have been invited by the CID, but the minority in parliament held a press conference on Tuesday and attacked the CID boss and DAILY GUIDE over the invitation and the publication of the story respectively.
But the Second Deputy Speaker of Parliament and NDC MP for Nadowli/Kaleo, Alban Bagbin, who was cited among the initial 25 invited by the police, is said to be very furious with some members of his own party whom he is accusing of leaking the names of the affected NDC MPs to the CID.
On his twitter handle on Wednesday, April 11 after the minority’s press conference, Mr Alban Bagbin alleged that some selfish individuals wanting to lead the party might have leaked the names to the CID.
“If anybody thinks that leaking our names to the police CID thwarts our chances and advances their selfish claim to leadership in our party, then my brother, think again because when we go down, we go down together. A word to the wise…,” according to the tweet.
In the new communication, the CID indicated that all those MPs would have to provide more information to help it properly investigate the matter.
The CID, which is investigating the matter, earlier invited and met with some of the accused MPs but has now said they would be recalled for further questioning by the Director-General of the CID.
It, however, did not state the exact date they would be invited again.
“Prior to the invitation of the affected MPs, the CID duly notified the leadership of parliament.”
The police assured the public that due process would be followed in the investigation into the matter, the letter stated.
Meanwhile, some cadres of the party in the Greater Accra Region have described the indictment of ex-ministers over the supposed double salaries as a misadventure.
Fred Atsu Anthony and Nelson Adu, the two cadres who addressed a news conference in Accra yesterday, said it was a well-known fact that MPs do not receive their salaries and benefits until they had finished serving their tenure at which point the government would have set up a committee to determine their benefits.
“Since those benefits are determined by a committee, how can anyone claim that any MP has received double salaries?” Mr Anthony quizzed.
By William Yaw Owusu