The Secretariat of the Nation Builders Corps, NABCO, says it is awaiting financial clearance from the Ministry of Finance to provide permanent employment for the beneficiaries.
This comes after the beneficiaries protested last Thursday to demand permanent employment as well as arrears owed to them.
In an interview with Citi News, the Head of Communication and Public Relations at the NABCO Secretariat, Iddrisu Tahiru, said NABCO is also working with institutions to ascertain the number of vacant positions.
“For the concerns over their permanent employment, it goes beyond us. Finance needs to give clearance, the various institutions they work with also need to declare vacancies.”
“We can’t force the institutions to employ anyone. They have to first declare their vacancies, and then we see how many we can secure employment for. They should exercise patience, once finance gives clearance we will push them.”
He added that beneficence who are yet to receive allowances owed to them should visit their district offices for redress.
“We do not owe them. Their contract ended in October, and we have paid them till then. However, there are some individuals who have payment issues. The beneficiaries are expected to submit timesheets in their various districts before payment is done. For those whose coordinators do not confirm that they were at post, we can’t pay them.”
“Also, for those under the Heal Ghana module, some of them got clearance from the Ghana Health Service and were posted. For those, the controller is responsible for their payment.”
The nation builders corps is an initiative by the government of Ghana in an attempt to address the unemployment challenges.
The three-year-long contract with over 100,000 beneficiaries under six modules ended in October 2021.
But the government instructed various agencies to maintain these beneficiaries as steps were taken to finalise their exit.
Amongst the options for the beneficiaries was for them to be maintained, continue their education, or venture into their own businesses.
But the protestors say the government is not paying attention to those who want to be maintained.
