Buying bonds has become my biggest regret – Pensioner narrates ordeal

For retired Medical Doctor, Dr Samuel Quaye, buying government bonds a year ago was a prudent way to invest his money.

The retiree who has failing health believed that when his principal matured, he would have enough funds to facilitate the medical help he needed.

However, his optimism was short-lived when the government announced its decision to undertake a Domestic Debt Exchange Programme.

Dr Quaye who invested all his life savings has been anxious ever since.

Looking back, the retired doctor regrets buying bonds. Although he knows that he could not have kept the huge sum of money in his home, Dr Quaye now wishes he had saved his money outside the country.

“I made a big mistake buying bonds. I am regretting it. I know I had no alternative then because for such an amount I couldn’t keep it in my house that is why I invested it.

“We are in a world where you cannot save your money at home. But now, I think I should have invested my money outside the country,” he said on Joy FM’s Super Morning Show on Monday.

Dr Quaye is one of the numerous individual pension bondholders who will be affected by government’s ongoing debt exchange programme.

Unhappy by the situation, these retirees have been picketing the Finance Ministry to drum home their displeasure.

Many of them are worried that their source of income will be curtailed by the programme, thus, intensifying their economic woes.

Today, the pensioners have once again massed up at the forecourt of the Finance Ministry to protest their inclusion in the programme.

Former Chief Justice, Sophia Akuffo, who joined the picketers last week described the initiative by the Finance Minister as wicked, unlawful, wrongs and disrespectful. Myjoyonline