The Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT) recovered GH¢10 million as repayment of students’ loans by the end of 2008. This was an increase over the GH¢8.57 million recovered in 2007. The Head of the Public Affairs Department of SSNIT, Mr Kwaku Osei-Bimpong, who made this known to the Daily Graphic, said the repayment was either through cash or social security contributions. The recovery through cash was about 35 per cent, while the recovery through social security contributions was about 60 per cent, with five per cent being those of guarantors if the students could not be located, he explained. According to Mr Osei-Bimpong, the organisation had consistently recovered GH¢1 million every month this year. He said since 2004 when the organisation launched an aggressive campaign to recover money owed it, “the response has been encouraging”. “Apart from the local arrangement where students can go to any branch of SSNIT to pay, we also have external arrangements where students outside the country pay their loans through the Ghana International Bank in London,” he explained. He said in terms of disbursement, SSNIT was virtually winding up and that once that was completed, “the concentration of the organisation will be on the recovery of the loans as and when they are due”. He said looking at the current trend of repayment and the manner in which the increases had been consistent in the past five years, SSNIT would recover every pesewa due it. He appealed to those who had completed school and were working but were yet to pay back the loans they collected while in school to endeavour to honour their part of the agreement by paying back. Mr Osei-Bimpong said the payment terms were flexible, as people could pay through instalments. Source: Daily Graphic