…says pensioners’ complaints triggered legal action against NIS
(Kaieteur News) – Attorney-at-law Christopher Ram says repeated complaints from pensioners prompted him to initiate the legal challenge against the National Insurance Scheme (NIS), warning that the matter will be taken to the High Court if the Scheme fails to provide an acceptable response.
Ram, commenting on the move by himself and several trade unions to demand compliance with the statutory minimum pension and payment of arrears, said he decided to act after hearing complaints from pensioners while he was in the United States.
“Responding to repeated complaints from pensioners while I was in the USA, I decided to act on the minimum pension which this Administration has violated for six years,” Ram said.
Attorney, Christopher Ram
Following his return to Guyana, Ram said he invited the Guyana Trades Union Congress (GTUC) and its affiliates to join the initiative, with 10 unions eventually responding.
On 1st October, the group wrote the National Insurance Board demanding compliance with the statutory minimum pension and payment of arrears allegedly owed since 2021.
Ram said the group has given the Board until next Friday, 9th October, to respond before High Court proceedings are filed.
However, he said he does not expect the NIS to provide a satisfactory response.
“We do not expect one,” Ram said, citing what he described as his experience with the Scheme when dealing with disputed benefits.
“In my experience, the NIS Administration’s answer on disputed benefits is not only no, but never,” he said.
Ram pointed to another recent matter in which he wrote the NIS on 28th September seeking payment for one claimant and temporary relief for another.
According to Ram, the NIS Corporate Secretary responded the same day, advising him to take the matter to court.
“It was probably the first time in the Scheme’s almost sixty years that it answered a letter on the day it was received,” Ram said.
He criticised that response, arguing that the NIS should not be treating pensioners and other beneficiaries in such a manner.
“That is not how a social security institution should treat the people it exists to serve,” he said.
“If court is the only language the NIS understands, then court it will be,” Ram added.
Ram said the proposed case is based on three principal grounds—the wording of the relevant regulation, what he described as a legitimate expectation created by the NIS’s past practice of linking the minimum pension to the Public Service minimum wage, and the principle established in the Teemal case that acquired pension rights cannot subsequently be taken away.
Meanwhile, Ram expressed disappointment that several major unions have not joined the initiative.
He specifically named the Guyana Public Service Union, headed by Patrick Yarde, the Guyana Teachers’ Union and the Clerical and Commercial Workers Union.
He said the Guyana Agricultural and General Workers Union, NAACIE and the Guyana Labour Union, headed by Carvill Duncan, have also not communicated any interest since the initiative was announced.
“I have stood with these unions on the Picket Line from time to time, most recently the Guyana Teachers Union,” Ram said.
He questioned the decision by those unions not to participate, particularly since many of their members could eventually depend on the minimum NIS pension.
“That these unions would not join an initiative for their own members, many of whom retire on the minimum pension, raises questions about whose interest they serve,” Ram said.
Ram also disclosed that, based on what he described as conservative assumptions, pension arrears for the period 2021 to 2025 could exceed $5 billion, before interest.
“The true figure is likely far higher, and only the NIS knows it,” he said.
The dispute centres on the statutory minimum pension and whether successive increases in the Public Service minimum wage should have resulted in corresponding increases in the NIS minimum pension.
The unions and Ram have given the NIS seven days to state its position and, if it disputes liability, provide the precise legal basis for its position.
Failure to provide a satisfactory response could result in legal proceedings being filed on 9th October.
Source: Kaieteur News
