Claim: Pictures show pensioners besieging Finance Ministry over delays in paying their benefits
Source: Twitter post
Verdict: MISLEADING
Researched by Gifty Tracy Aminu
Have pensioners in Ghana besieged the Finance Ministry over delays in payment of their benefits?
Pictures of some elderly persons sitting at the premises of Ghana’s Finance Ministry, demanding the payment of their pension benefits have surfaced on the internet.
The pictures shared by a Twitter user on October 19, 2022, with the caption “unpaid pensioners besiege Finance Ministry over delays. The country is broke”, have generated hundreds of engagements (retweets and likes) on the micro-blogging app.
This fact-check report seeks to verify the accuracy of the claim.
A screenshot of the Twitter post
Fact-Check
Some of the pictures published on the micro-blogging platform, Twitter had been watermarked with www.citinewsroom.com (CNR) – which is the digital platform of mainstream media organization, Omni media, owners of Citi FM and Citi TV.
This clue helped us narrow our Google search of the specific claim: “Unpaid pensioners besiege Finance Ministry over delays,” as published by the CNR digital platform.
One of the watermarked pictures published by CNR
The Google search results showed a news article published in April 2018, and authored by Godwin Akweiteh Allotey, with the same pictures that have now been posted on Twitter, detailing how some older citizens/retirees flocked to the Ministry of Finance over delays in the release of their pensions.
The CNR report published on April 30, 2018
Ghana is currently enduring some turbulent economic times, as the World Bank has classified the country as high debt distressed amid surging inflation and hikes in prices of goods and services and a fast-depreciating currency.
However, the pictures are currently being misrepresented as they were published by CNR in 2018 and not in 2022, a false impression that is being created on social media.
Verdict
Pictures of some elderly persons sitting at the premises of the Finance Ministry and demanding the payment of their pension benefits are being MISLEADINGLY characterised.
