Bill on the East African Community (EAC) pension claims in the offing

_______________

The domestication of the East African Community (EAC) Mediation Agreement of 2000 is on track to facilitate payment of terminal benefits to former employees of the defunct East African Community.

This was revealed by the First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for East African Community Affairs, Rebecca Kadaga, during the plenary sitting on Tuesday,(October 3rd)

“There is an enabling framework to facilitate the payment. The outstanding task is verifying the genuine claimants with the involvement of all stakeholders to ensure that only legitimate and bona fide claimants are paid,” said Kadaga.

The EAC collapsed in June 1977 when member countries (Uganda, Kenya, and Tanzania) Kenya refused to commit any funds to finance the 1977/78 budget and announced withdrawal. After the failure to keep the General Fund Services, the EAC ceased to operate in 1977.

The Mediation Agreement was signed by the former partner states in May 1984 but according to Kadaga, attempts to domesticate it failed twice in 1990 and 2004, with none of the two Bills being presented to Parliament.

Kadaga told parliament that between 2019 and 2023, the Ministry of East African Community Affairs has verified and paid 586 claimants. 

“For 2023/2024, the ministry has so far verified 31 additional files worth US$93,533. 

Another batch of 1,297 files are being verified and upon conclusion of the audit exercise, a supplementary budget will be made to ask funds from the Finance Ministry to pay cleared claimants,” she added.

Kadaga added that 474 former employees of the defunct East African Airways have been fully paid, whereas 150 remain pending due to failure of the ministry and their lawyers to physically trace them. 

“The ministry has, in the process, encountered a series of challenges including lack of readily available, authentic and verifiable records as well as multiple claims by claimants that are not genuine,” she said on Tuesday.