Retrenched man’s quest for pension

Mr Joseph Mpamya is a former agricultural officer. PHOTO BY Felix Basiime 

By Felix Basiime and Amanda Kawaisolya

Posted  Saturday, July 13   2013 at  01:00  http://www.monitor.co.ug/News/National/Retrenched-man-s-quest-for-pension/-/688334/1912956/-/14cdacn/-/index.html

Pension woes. When Mr Joseph Mpamya was retrenchment in 1992, he was the Rwenzori sub-region agricultural officer. Due to his struggles to get his pension, other pensioners elected him as their national chairman. Mr Mpamya, a technical adviser to Kabarole Farmers Association, told Felix Basiime and Amanda Kawaisolya about the pursuit for his pension. Below are excerpts:

Kabarole- It all started in 1992 when the government made an announcement that 6,337 civil servants were to be retrenched. 

My name appeared on the list, so we were asked to fill forms and be given packages of appreciation. I was then working as a regional agricultural officer for the Rwenzori sub-region.

Government had considered the following for one to be retrenched: 55 years and above, a non-performer and those unqualified, but I decided to push for my pension although I did not belong to any of those.

For me I got my package but in the process I learnt that I was maliciously retrenched because I was below 55 years and I had just been promoted as principal agricultural officer.

Legal process

The legal process took me and others eight years to win our pension rights In 1998. I prepared my case through my lawyer M/s John Matovu & Co. Advocates and sued government for nonpayment of my pension which World Bank and the International Monetary Fund had advised government to do.

This lawyer was so shrewd and decided to include all the retrenched 6,337 in this matter. In order to achieve this, he placed adverts in newspapers inviting all the retrenched across the country. 

Others didn’t turn up because some were already in villages in sorrow and could not access the newspapers then.

The lawyers contacted Public Service, asking why government refused to pay pension to people retrenched in 1992.

The minister of Public Service then responded that this was because they were dismissed and that the exercise was done to reduce the number of civil servants and they be given some package to go home and pave way for the ones left behind to be paid better salaries.

But considering the Constitution, all the retired civil servants were entitled to pension, so through our lawyers we went to court. 

We were 15 but when a group suing is more than three people, court allows you to choose three people to represent you. We elected Charles Abola as the chairman, Sylvester Agwaru as the assistant and A. Kasirivu. They were representing the 6,337 with our hired lawyer Mr Matovu and we started the process.

The trial Judge ES Lugayizi did not find difficulty in determining our case, he just ruled that: You people should be entitled to pension. 
That was in 1998. Court ordered that we be declared pensioners with effect from the day we left office since June 28, 1992.

But unfortunately this ruling came at a time when some of the pensioners had died, so some officials in the Public Service started their game.

They started creating ghost files and since they had the records, they knew who was coming and who was not because they are the ones who had requisitioned the money from the Treasury.

Since they had authorisation from the government backed by court ruling, they could get as much money as they could from the pensioners. So they knew that when some people die no one would go to claim that money.

They had the data and could create and add files since some pensioners didn’t know about the money. 
To make matters worse, our lawyer didn’t bother to look for his clients.

When the Public Service officials realised that they would be discovered, they started inviting people informally, pensioners or not from different districts to be given some of this money so that the unclaimed files show that the money was claimed.

When some of us later went back to court over money for the remaining seven years, the High Court presided over by Justice V.F. Musoke Kibuuka awarded a uniform sum of Shs4.5 million as general damages in respect of each pensioner. This was on August 4, 2011. 

Then the Public Service started paying us, the claimants of this money. But when I reached Kampala, my colleagues told me that some amount was deducted from it.

On asking them why, they said they were waiting for me to come and find out as their chairperson.

When I reached the ministry, they told me that our lawyer said the money we gave him was not enough so he wanted more money and that’s why they deducted Shs1.4 million from every pensioner’s account which was wrong because we had paid him earlier in full.

In 2000, we made an agreement with our lawyer to deduct only 15 per cent of the money due to each pensioner and this money was amounting to Shs1.2 billion in total and he was not supposed to get any more money even if we needed assistance from him later on the same matter.

The ministry officials told me that maybe my colleagues could have separately agreed on this with the lawyer in my absence.

I told them that I am alive, I am not dead and I am the chairman. How can this be done without consulting me? So they told me to go back home in Fort Portal and that they would find a way to pay me the whole amount due to me.

When I checked my account later, I realised they had duped me, they had deducted the Shs1.4 million and I became mad. 

So I went back to Kampala and I asked them what authority they had used to deduct my money. I demanded for an explanation why they had doubled rate from 15 per cent to 30 that made it Shs8 billion accruing from 6,337 claimants.

I went to the Attorney General and he told me that they paid this money to a law firm called M/s Mable Law Firm but who did not represent us in court. Public Service officials knew what they were doing, they created this law firm and this was authorised by the Attorney General.

So it became very strange and complicated having Public Service paying money to a strange law firm behind the backs of the claimants. We were defeated and we settled with what they wished to pay us.

Money received
I first received Shs6 million for the first seven years I spent without payment after leaving my job from 1992-1999. Then starting with January 2000, I was put on a monthly payment of Shs270,000 which has since risen to Shs1,150,000 due to general salary increments.

I have had all my plans shattered, I had started a fruit processing factory in Fort Portal after I was retrenched knowing that I would get my pension very soon, but this project has since collapsed due to lack of capital.

I was forced to sell my few exotic cows in Kabarole to survive and to educate my children, so the dairy farm is no more.

I pity other pensioners who are not part of the retrenched. When they will retire, they will move up and down chasing their pension until they give up because it becomes costly and others die so when all this happens, all the money remains with the Ministry of Public Service yet the next of kin are supposed to get this money but they are at times not aware.