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Read More...US250,000 Retirement For Each LTA Commissioner Finalized
Commissioners of the Liberia Telecommunications Authority have allotted US$250,000 each as retirement benefits in LTA’s proposed fiscal budget, Rep. George Sylvester Mulbah (Bong County) has alarmed in an interview with this paper.
“The act creating the LTA gives its commissioners four years in power. I’m told, that they (commissioners) have proposed US$250,000 for each person as retirement benefits when their term is over. Yes, that would be their severance pay,” he queried.
Tenure of the current commissioners at the LTA should end in 2013.
But Rep. Mulbah, who is member on the LTA board, denounced as “unfair and unjust” for a group of individuals to take such amounts of cash for jobs that they failed to perform.
Despite the “huge salaries and benefits” received by LTA commissioners, including their chair, Ms. Angelique Weeks, they have failed to perform their role in regulating GSM companies in the country, he charged.
“The President made a promise that she would not allow anybody at the LTA to make above US$5000 monthly. But currently, we are told, each person (Commissioner) makes over US$10,000 while their chair, Angelique Weeks is making almost US$15,000 per month.
“[But] the LTA has not been able to perform its regulatory authority in line with the act that created it. Right now, GSM companies are fussing amongst themselves. It is the responsibility of the LTA to resolve all of those issues, but they are not doing that,” Rep. Mulbah deplored.
Meanwhile, the Inquirer newspaper Monday quoted LTA commissioner Lamini Waritay as supporting Rep. Mulbah’s claim that commissioners make more than US$5000 monthly.
He added: “US$7000...as monthly salary for commissioners from a US$10,000 gross salary inluding taxes. The LTA chairperson receives just a little bit more on this figures.”
He said the entity is a “multi-billion dollar business” with no record showing how much its deposit into the government revenue on a yearly basis, while the fiscal budget stands at about US$600,000,000. This would suggest that the LTA alone is wealthier than the country.
