President signs Reconciliation Bill
Prez
Kufour scores a first
Where
are the Jobs?
President signs Reconciliation Bill
Senior Minister, Mr Joseph Henry Mensah, has
hinted that the President has signed the Reconciliation Bill into law.
At a people’s assembly at Winneba at the
weekend, he stated that the Reconciliation Law is expected to bring Ghanaians
together to accelerate the development process in the country.
He said the New Patriotic Party is committed to
providing an atmosphere for free expression of opinions and views on all
national issues. He said many people suffered all kinds of atrocities under
various governments and the “wounds have to be healed and people reconciled and
compensated, if necessary, for the country to move on.”
Mr Mensah said such important laws are
necessary to promote the development of the country and appealed to all
Ghanaians not to play politics with the reconciliation exercise.
He assured the gathering that the government is
concerned about the plight of the rural people and will ensure that everything
is done to improve living conditions in those areas through the various poverty
reduction interventions.
Mr Mensah made it clear that the government
will not discriminate against any group of people in the disbursement of the
poverty alleviation fund.
In a related development, Mr Mensah has asked
the various houses of chiefs to ensure that the process of gazetting chiefs is
devoid of corrupt practices. He noted that the dubious manner in which some
chiefs are gazetted has contributed to the increasing number of chieftaincy
disputes in the country.
Mr Mensah, who was addressing a well-attended people’s
assembly at Agona Swedru, stated that the corrupt practices do not augur well
for the chieftaincy institution. He urged chiefs to live up to expectation and
also help resolve the many chieftaincy disputes institution.
He urged chiefs to live up to expectation and
also help resolve the many chieftaincy disputes in the communities. The Senior
Minister said the government’s policies in the past year have stabilized the
economy, adding that “the extra three years will focus on creating jobs,
improving health and educational standards”, and called for support from the
people to make this possible.
More…/
Tests conducted by the Department of
Pharmaceutical Chemistry at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and
Technology in Kumasi, have revealed that some drugs given to patients at the
psychiatric hospitals are unwholesome.
According to the report, products procured from
Zhejiang Medicines and Health Products of China and Nabros Pharma Pvt Ltd.,
India, cannot be said to be of international standards.
The tests were conducted following recent media
reports that drugs being administered to patients at the country’s psychiatric
hospitals were substandard and not efficacious.
In the report copied to the Head of the
Department, Dr J.B. Kwakye, and signed by Mr Kwame Sarpong Asiedu, the analyst,
named the drugs as Chlorpromazine tablets BP, Amitriptyline tablets BP and
Trifluperazine tablets BP.
It said the tablets are discoloured orange and
white, with no evidence of coating decomposes on exposure to light and moisture
because of bad storage and packaging. The report also said the drugs have
fungal growth while some have no uniformity in terms of weight.
“Based on preliminary findings, the three
products cannot be said to be of BP (British Pharmacopea) standards as stated
by their labels,” the report said. The report stated that the drugs are
unsuitable for medical use in their current state and, therefore, “unwholesome
for human consumption.”
Meanwhile, the Accra Psychiatric Hospital has,
since last Thursday, stopped dispensing the drugs and detailed all psychiatric
hospitals to immediately stop administering the drugs to patients. According to
a source at the hospital, patients have been returning the drugs to the
hospital since they heard of the news that the drugs were not efficacious.
GRi…/
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The collapse of the Omnibus Services Authority
(OSA), one time the leading transport company in Ghana, finally came when
Friday, last week, the management and staff of the company were ushered into
the weekend with the seizure of their property for auctioning.
OSA owes Mobil Oil (Gh) Limited to the tune of
˘248.5 million being fuel supply to the transport company over the years. An
Accra High Court in October, last year, confiscated the property of OSA to
Mobil Oil (Gh) Limited to auction to defray the debt.
Based on the order, OSA was given all the
necessary opportunity to settle their indebtedness, even after court judgement
was delivered, but two post-dated cheques issued by OSA to Mobil Oil were
dishonoured on presentation and no effort was made to redeem those dishonoured
cheques with cash, this paper can reveal.
The execution exercise was carried out in a
Hollywood fashion under the direction of the management of Johnson Complex, the
debt collectors and official auctioneers for Mobil Oil, under police
supervision involving court bailiffs from the Accra High Court.
It started some few minutes after 5 am and
lasted nearly three hours. A notice dated January 11, 2002 was pasted on all
the vehicles at the premises of OSA, indicating that public auction of the
vehicles starts on Tuesday, January 22, 2002. The condition of sale under the
terms of auctioning has it that the highest bidder shall be the purchaser, and
the terms are strictly by cash or bankers cheques.
It was a pathetic scene as staff of the
transport company, most of whom have not been paid for the past seven to eight
months and hoping to make some cash on daily rounds for survival, were visited
with the shocking and traumatic news that they were losing their jobs, after
months of work without pay.
The staff members mobilized in groups to
discuss the thorny issue, which had all along been kept a secret within
management circles, with some of them openly criticizing management for the
mess that collapsed the company and vowing to use all means to retrieve their
outstanding salary.
Several vehicles which were returning to the
premises for business were signalled by the angry staff to part somewhere
around the Kaneshie market, and monitoring by the Chronicle indicated as many
as seven OSA vehicles parked around the market.
Drivers who returned to account for their daily
sales made had no alternative but to pocket the money, while most senior
management members were spotted opening lockers, apparently to make some last
minute survival moves.
Some angry staff told the paper that a day
before the execution exercise, a tipper truck fully loaded with furniture was
taken out of the premises under the instruction of the Managing Director and no
reason was assigned for that unusual decision. The workers did not know that
was their last day at work.
A tour around the premises of OSA indicated as
many as over 50 condemned vehicles, parked with no attempt to bring them back
onto the road, and the staff who spoke to the paper said most of those vehicles
had only minor problems and management always claimed there was no cash to
repair them in spite of several loans contracted.
The Chronicle is still investigating some of
the outstanding loans contracted by the collapsed OSA and will bring to readers
how the issue is being handled especially now that the company has collapsed.
More…/
A procurement officer of the Ghana Cocoa Board
at Tema, one Frimpong, is being hounded by personnel of the Serious Fraud
Office (SFO), for allegedly conniving with four senior officers of the Ghana
Ports and Harbours Authority (GPHA), to steal more than ˘280 million from the
Ports Authority.
Investigations carried out by this reporter
showed that personnel of the SFO who have taken custody of a voluminous pack of
cost sheets and other documents from the GPHA have written to Cocobod officials
to assist in the apprehension of the run-away Frimpong, who vacated his post on
December 7, last year.
An instruction from the same security arm led
to the interdiction of four cocoa shed senior officers. Their names are however
being withheld.
The Chronicle was informed that Frimpong was
going to the cocoa shed to book 102 men, made up of six casual gangs, to load
tarpaulin, jute sacks and spraying machines from the board’s stations at Nsawam
and Swedru.
Documents would then be processed and money
cashed at the GPHA pay office. In all cases, the gang heads or their deputies
were made to go and collect the money from the SSB Bank cashier at the
Authorities’ pay office.
A procedure, such as presentation of identity card,
signature or thumbprint before money paid, was ignored. When the deal was
detected files dating back to last year were called for and another interesting
part found was that the deals took place on Friday nights and weekends when
˘23,000 is paid for the day time, while ˘69,000 is paid to each labourer for
the night over the weekend.
A check at the Cocobod Tema offices revealed
that the last time that their bonded warehouse was opened was in 1998 and that
there was no record to indicate that the bond was opened for loading of such
items by GPHA gangs. This was attested to by the watchmen at the warehouse.
According to the Cocoa Board, for the past
seven years all their jute sacks are containerized and that there is no need
for gangs to load them again since the containers are lifted direct from the
vessels onto trucks to Nsawam and Swedru.
An official source at GPHA said that the SFO
has requested names of officials at its pay office and SSB Bank personnel who
performed duty for the past two years and this, the official said, will narrow
down on the syndicate.
The Tema District Officer of SFO, Mr Ahiagbe,
when contacted, said that the case is under investigation and he would thus not
comment. The present situation has sent shockwaves at GPHA.
In a related development, the scandal at the
authority’s pay office where ghost names were reportedly presented to cash
money has risen to an alarming stage. Even though the investigation being
carried out by the SFO in Accra has not travelled far, about ˘2 billion was
found to have been siphoned off through ghostly means. Six officers implicated
in that case have already been interdicted.
GRi…/
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Prez
Kufour scores a first
The
gamble, which President Kufuor took when he decided to face the public at the
Accra International Conference Centre on Tuesday January 7th has
paid off handsomely.
People
who earlier on had doubts about the delivery instincts of the President thumbed
up for him because of his forthright manner he picked and answered the
questions which were at times homely.
“This
is the first time that a President has opened himself up to the public scrutiny
not before the press but the whole people at large” said a middle aged man who
calls himself Dawson Amedefo.
“This
is what is expected of him as a President and Ghanaians must be grateful to him
for the change in attitude,” volunteered a university under graduate.
The
People’s Assembly matter must not be a nine-day wonder but must be an annual
affair. It has helped us to have a correct assessment of our leadership at
close quarters,” said a party activist.
More…/
The
National Union of Ghana Students (NUGS) representative on the Ghana Education
Trust Fund (GETF) Mr Amoahene Sekyere has described as unfortunate comments by
the Minister of Finance, Mr Osafo Marfo that the NPP government has done better
than the NDC government in terms of releasing the funds to the trust.
Mr
Sekyere was reacting to comments reported to have been made by the Finance
Minister Hon Yaw Osafo Marfo at the People’s Assembly in Accra on January 7.
This was at a press conference organised by the NUGS to call on the government
to put on hold as interim report of the restructure of the Students Loan
Scheme.
According
to the NUGS Representative on the board of trustees to the GETF, Hon Osafo
Marfo was heard comparing what the NPP government was able to release as at the
end of 2001 to what the NDC released in 2000 to the fund.
He
said that GETF was supposed to receive around 528 billion cedis by the close of
June last year but as at the close of December 2001 the fund had received only
130 billion cedis.
He
said they received assurance from the Finance Minister but “surprisingly that
has not been done and this man was at the People’s Assembly trying to sort of
praise his administration to have done better than the NDC government.
“I
saw that as unfortunate because a slight pick against the law is still a kick
against the law.” He said. Mr Amoahene Sekyere recalled that out of a ˘168
billion that was supposed to have been released by the NDC government in 2000,
only ˘31 billion cedis was paid in the GEFT.
He
wondered why governments would want to defend themselves even if they go wrong.
He said four (4) subsection two (2) of the GEFT Act, states that “Money meant
for the GETF is supposed to be put in an account opened by the Board of
Trustees of the Fund 30 days after the money has been accrued. This has not
been done and we go about blowing our own horns”, he whipped.
He
added that the fund is not a surrogate or substitute to education so whatever
the government does as far as the funding of Education is concerned only adds
up to the fund.
More…/
Dr
Daniel Antwi, a high profile Presbyterian Church “man of God” has been
suspended indefinitely by the General Assembly Council of the Presbyterian
Church of Ghana.
Dr
Daniel Antwi who was the former Principal of the Trinity Theological Seminary
located at Legon was suspended because he acted against what he was teaching at
the Trinity Theological Seminary.
He
was sanctioned for committing “Bigamy” that is, he wedded a woman outside his
wedlock, which the Presbyterian faith frowns against, because the Holy Bible
does not expect such immoral turpitude even from its ordinary members, much
more from a priest who is supposed to lead by example.
Dr
Daniel Antwi who had not divorced his wife wedded another woman at the City
Council Hall. This bad news got to Dr Daniel Antwi’s original wife and this
became a source of worry to the Presbyterian Church of Ghana who had no option
than to suspend him indefinitely.
In
Priestly Parlance, his Collar had been removed and that as long as his
suspension continues he cannot preach to the faithful flocks.
GRi…/
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your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Where
are the Jobs?
Barely
two months ago after the registration of unemployed people, a number of them
are beginning to demand the job for which they were registered. Speaking to the
High Street Journal (HSJ), a number of them said they wonder if the government
is going to do anything about the statistics it collected. “We have been told
that we were just used by an international NGO to conduct a research”, said
James Boateng, an unemployed.
Others
said the government prides itself in the fact that it has created jobs through
the mass cocoa spraying exercise and the afforestation programme. But they
argued that these two projects are to the benefit of the rural areas.
Besides,
employment under these programmes is temporary. According to Amadu Alhassan, a
graduate of Accra Technical Training Centre, what the government promised them
was permanent employment. He said they were made to believe that defunct
factories were going to be revived and thereby create jobs for them. One year
into the administration of the government, Amadu says, not one single factory
has been revived to provide employment to anybody.
When
we put it to them that the government will first have to compile the statistics
and assess the needs of each registered person, they wondered when this would
be finished. The government has a lot to contend with, especially on the
question of providing jobs for the unemployed.
We
at HSJ believe that the registration exercise was very necessary, if for
nothing else, but to give us an accurate picture of the unemployment situation
in the country. Currently, there are no figures on the employment situation and
this situation is not good enough for development planning.
Ghana
Statistical Services “recorded employment” figures were terminated in 1991, and
these figures show that “recorded employment” increased from 282,000 in 1982 to
464,000 in 1985 but had declined to 186,000 by 1991. But it would be disastrous
to use 1991 figures for any form of development planning.
However,
it is our hope that when government has actually finished the compilation of
the data, it will act to ensure that the hope is restored to the teeming
unemployed.
So
far, the economic policies being pursued by the government gives cause to
Ghanaians to hope for the better in 2002. This is in spite of the gloomy
picture painted by the United Nations on the projected growth rate of the world
economy. A growing economy is recognised as the best means of ensuring
sustainable employment creation. High interest rates, reflecting a tight
monetary policy, has in the past impeded investment in many sectors of the
economy and has prevented some employment in the private sector.
Today,
interest rates are at an all time low. Hopefully, more people will be able to
borrow to expand their business and thereby create employment for the hopeful,
but impatient unemployed. Perhaps the government spokesperson needs to at
reasonable intervals assure these people that they are at the centre of the
government’s economic programme.
More…/
At the last ECOWAS meeting held in Dakar, Senegal, Ghana expressed its desire and preparedness to host the headquarters of the Central Bank of the West African Monetary Union (WAMU).
ECOWAS
has a set criteria that a country must meet before it is deemed qualified to
host WAMU. These include accessibility, efficient communication facilities and
a good atmosphere for business. However, five other countries have now
expressed their desire to host WAMU. They are Nigeria, the Gambia, Liberia,
Sierra Leone and Guinea.
The
chances of Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea look very slim indeed. These
countries have been war-stricken for a long time, a situation that has greatly
shattered their economies. Even without doing an in-depth analysis of their
economies, one can see outright that they are incapable of playing host to an
institution of the magnitude of WAMU.
The
same, however, cannot be said of Nigeria and Gambia. Indeed, Gambia and Nigeria
are said to be at the closing stages of meeting the criteria, whereas Ghana is
only half-way through. Analysts are of the view that, if the current trend of
economic recovery in Ghana continues, then Ghana is likely to make it. But the
fact that Gambia and Nigeria are at the closing states of meeting the criteria,
when Ghana is only half-way through, sends some worrying signals.
What
is refreshing, however, is that the real key to getting the nod for hosting the
secretariat is the first two criteria or requirements. These are keeping
central bank financing of the national budget deficit limited to 10 per cent
and maintaining a maximum budget deficit-to-GDP ratio of five percent by the
end of 2000 and 4 per cent by the end of 2003.
GRi…/
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Stop
using media to settle cases- NDC
The National Democratic Congress (NDC) has cautioned its members to stop the use of the media as a means of putting their case against other colleagues. It warned that any member who goes contrary to the directive will be disciplined by the party.
A
statement issued in Accra at the weekend and signed by Alhaji Huudu Yahaya,
General Secretary of the party, said the practice where supporters use the
media to castigate against other colleagues not only adversely affect the image
of the party but it does not augur well for the unity of the party.
According
to Alhaji Yahaya, the practice does not appear to have stopped even after the
postponement of the party’s congress. He said any member who has any grievances
or complaints in whatever form should channel them through the appropriate
quarters for the necessary attention.
The
General Secretary said that the party was surprised about the letter of the
so-called Action Forum of the Sekyere West Constituency of the party, which was
carried by an Accra daily of January 9 that sought to level accusation on the
person of Dr Obed Asamoah, a leading member of the party.
“The
so-called Action Forum cannot act as the mouthpiece of any of the organs of the
party as it is not known in NDC official circles. Similarly, we view with grave
concern the story carried in the Tuesday January 8 issue of the “Independent”
Newspaper with the banner headline “Alabi calls Rawlings Bluff”, where certain
leading members of NDC were portrayed
in very bad light.
The
party assured its members that the leadership of NDC was committed to ensuring
complete unity and nothing should be done to distract such course.
GRi…/
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