Foday Sadique Fofana, new president
A retired staff of the social security outfit, NASSIT, has been elected President of the NASSIT Pensioners Association. Until his election over the weekend, Foday Sadique Fofana was Chairman of the Northern Region Chapter of the association.
In a election held in Bo on Friday, Fofana defeated Victor Macauley who is Chairman of the Western Area Chapter of the association and acted as President following the death of the then substantive holder, Henry Sheku.
The NASSIT Pensioners Association was born out of Act No. 5 of 2001 which set up the Trust as a statutory body for the handling of pensions and other retirement benefits in the country. Under that law the head of the Pensioners Association a trustee member of NASSIT.
Shortly after his election, Fofana said he would move towards ensuring a mandatory membership for all NASSIT pensioners for the betterment of every pensioner.
"There is no way the Association can discriminate against nonmembers on the positive outcomes of our advocacy for increases in pension payments or other services for NASSIT pensioners” he said, adding: “membership to the Association therefore has to be mandatory and universal".
He said such membership would enable the association to generate enough funds for its programmes. At present it is dependent on the goodwill of NASSIT to carry out its activities.
He says his priority is to embark on a needs assessment tour of all the four Regional Chapters in preparation for the next National Executive Meeting to be held in September in Makeni.
(C) Politico 18/05/16
