Taking ex-gratia not mandatory – Edudzi Tameklo

Taking or accepting ex gratia for serving Ghana in one public portfolio or another is not mandatory, legal practitioner Godwin Edudzi Tameklo has said.

He stressed that a recipient of an ex gratia has the right to accept or reject it.

“It is not mandatory for the recipient to accept ex gratia”, he argued.

The Agbogbomefia of the Asogli State, Togbe Afede XIV, recently returned an amount of GHS365,392.67 paid to him as ex gratia by the state for serving on the Council of State between 2017 and 2020.

The business mogul, in a statement, said he does not think it is appropriate to be paid ex gratia for a part-time job he did for the state for which he received a monthly salary.

“I want to add that my rejection of the payment was consistent with my general abhorrence of the payment of huge ex gratia and other outrageous benefits to people who have, by their own volition, offered to serve our poor country,” he said in a statement.

However, Mr Tameklo, who is also an aide to former president John Dramani Mahama, explained that it is the reason some Article 71 officeholders commit the payment of their allowances and other emoluments to specific projects.

He cited, as an example, the deductions made from the allowances of the appointees of Mr Mahama and his National Democratic Congress administration for the construction of some CHP compounds across the country.

“So, it is no big issue if a recipient rejects the payment of ex gratia on a principle he or she believes in,” he stated.

He said this was not a novelty because First Lady Rebecca Akufo-Addo and Mrs Samira Bawumia, the wife of Vice-President Mahamudu Bawumia, both returned to the state, salaries paid to them in 2021.