GRi Press Review
Ghana 26 - 07 - 2001
I'm fit to
be CJ
Sub-region
looks up to Nigeria
SSS
boarding fees go up
Pistol-wielding
bus conductor arrested
8 schools
score 0%
90-year-old
jailed for defilement
2 vie for
GFA Gen. Sec's post
If I were
autocratic…
Sankofa
abused state resources
Minister's
fate in the balance
'Ato Dadzie
disbursed ¢2 billion to farmers'
Odoi Sykes
made envoy
Fixed match
Atta Mills
refutes our publication
Arthur,
Yeboah also deserve honour
Policewoman
victimized
¢28Bn tax
evasion
CPP is not
an opportunistic party
HIPC is
dangerous for Ghana
VAT Service
to end tax on essential drugs
A
successful summit
I'm fit to
b e CJ
The Acting
Chief Justice, Mr Justice E.K. Wiredu, has stated that he is qualified by
training and experience to be appointment to the Superior Court of Judicature,
reports The Daily Graphic.
Reacting to the writ filed against
him by Mr Philip Kweku Apaloo, a resident of Kaneshie in Accra, he described
the process challenging his appointment as diversionary and without foundation.
Speaking in an interview, Justice
Wiredu wondered how someone can challenge the appointment of a superior Court
judge in a High Court when the matter being questioned is purely a
constitutional issue.
He explained that any person who
feels aggrieved has the right to seek redress in court, but advised such
aggrieved persons to be conversant with the jurisdiction of the courts.
Justice Wiredu said people are at
liberty to seek redress in the High Court for infringement on their rights
while the Supreme Court seeks interpretation on the constitution.
The Chief Justice expressed
apprehension about the writ and wondered whether or not the High Court has
power to reverse his appointment.
He said the argument that he is not
qualified to hold a higher post on the bench, under the 1969 Constitution, is
not tenable because he was appointed by the National Liberation Council (NLC)
regime before the Second Republican Constitution came into force.
"I was appointed in December,
1968, and the appointment took effect in January 1969 while the 1969
Constitution came into force on August 22, 1969," he added.
According to the Chief Justice, his
promotion to the Supreme Court was not contingent on appointment to the High
Court saying that "after all, some lawyers of several years experience are
appointed directly to the Supreme court".
On the allegation that he was
dismissed by the erstwhile PNDC regime in 1986 for corruption, Justice Wiredu
said he petitioned the PNDC on the matter and the decision was reviewed.
He stated his intention to contest
the case by filing his defence immediately he is served with the writ.
Justice Wiredu denied ever
frustrating Mr Apaloo in his bid to file the writ in court, adding "if he
faced any difficulties, it was purely procedural".
Graphic investigations indicate that
the motion filed by Mr Apaloo to restrain Justice Wiredu from being vetted by
Parliament has been slated for hearing at the Fast Track High Court on July 31,
2001.
More…/
Sub-region
looks up to Nigeria
President
J.A. Kufuor has stated that the peoples of West Africa look up to Ghana and
Nigeria to promote economic prosperity and political stability in the
sub-region.
According to the Graphic, President
Kufuor told a 14-member delegation from the Federal House of Representatives of
Nigeria, currently on a visit to Ghana that political leaders and policy makers
could not fail in their attempt to integrate the economies of the sub-region.
The President said Ghana and
Nigeria, therefore, have a duty to pull along the rest of the sub-region to
achieve a fully integrated political, economic and social integration.
President Kufuor said the excellent
personal relationship between him and president Obasanjo should bind the
peoples of the two countries together for the overall development of the
sub-region.
"We are brother states; the
destiny of achieving political and economic evolution for the sub-region is in
our hands and we dare not fail the people," President Kufuor said.
More…/
SSS
boarding fees go up
Boarding
fees for senior secondary schools will go up from ¢280,000 to ¢392,000 from the
beginning of the next academic year.
This means the daily feeding fee
will be ¢4,200 for each student. Foreign students will pay $404 a term, the
Acting Director General of the Ghana Education Service, Alex Tettey-Enyo, told Radio
Ghana on Wednesday.
He attributed the increase to rising
market prices and explained that the new fees will help school authorities to
give each student three square meals a day.
Mr Tettey-Enyo said ¢30,000 will be
charged in the interim as textbook user fees for the next academic year, while
¢6,000 is also to be paid by every student annually as cultural fees for the
promotion of Art and Culture.
He cautioned that PTA fees should
not exceed 10 per cent of the total fees approved by the Ghana Education
Service Council and advised school authorities to seek approval from the Board
of Governors before they impose any special levies on students.
More…/
Pistol-wielding
bus conductor arrested
A
Pistol-wielding bus conductor of the Omnibus Service Authority (OSA), who used
the gun to threaten the traveling public at Wa, has been arrested by the Wa
Police.
The suspect, Joseph Kwesi Aboagye,
60, a senior bus conductor of OSA at Wa, was arrested on July 6 and the pistol
was found in his conductor's bag.
Police Inspector Daniel Dokpoh of
the Regional Police Public Relations outfit said Aboagye was arrested upon
information that he had been threatening people with the weapon at the least
provocation.
On interrogation, Aboagye told the
police that he found the weapon in a passenger's luggage, which was left at the
Wa OSA bus terminal about three weeks earlier.
GRi…/
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8 schools
score 0%
Headmasters
of Junior Secondary Schools (JSS) in the Asikuma-Odoben-Brakwa District whose
candidates scored zero per cent in the Basic Education Certificate Examinatioin
(BECE) will be demoted and transferred to understudy other heads, the District
Chief Executive, Sampson Kwame Anafato, announced this at a meeting with the
District Education Oversight Committee (DEOC) at Breman Asikuma last weekend.
The decision, he said, was intended
to make school heads responsible for what happened in their institutions.
According to the Ghanaian Times
eight schools in the district scored zero percentage in the 1999/2000 BECE
while the average pass up to aggregate 30 was 35.5 percent, a situation the DCE
described as unacceptable.
More…/
90-year-old
jailed for defilement
The
authorities of Sunyani Central Prisons, suspecting an ambiguity in the offence
of a jailed 90-year-old man, have called for a review of his case.
The Techiman Circuit Tribunal last
Friday sentenced the old man, Sulemana Basare to seven years in prison for a
charge of defiling a 16-year-old girl, but prison officers wonders whether he
could have committed the offence.
Mr Ishamael Baidoo-Ahmed, Brong Ahafo Regional
Director of Prisons told the Ghana News Agency that, "the old man is so
physically weak that he is not able to stand up by himself.
For example, he said, that the old
man could not attend to nature's call unassisted, adding, "since Friday,
he has been wetting his clothes with his urine".
"There might be an ambiguity in
the offence committed, so there is the need for a review of his case.
Mr Baidoo-Ahmed said that he found
the aged convict's behaviour abnormal. "Perhaps he is a bit insane, but
considering his age and physical condition, the tribunal could have given him a
suspended sentence with a bond; that is, assuming he really committed the
offence".
The prison authorities are arranging
for a psychiatrist to examine him.
More…/
2 vie for
GFA Gen. Sec's post
The man to
take over the baton from Mr Worlanyo Agra, out-going Ghana Football Association
(GFA) General Secretary after July 31, has been found, according to a Ghanaian
Times report.
'Times Sports' investigations
unveiled that Sport Writers Association of Ghana (SWAG) Vice President, Mr Ebo
Quansah, is the likely choice.
He is said to be vying for the
almost-vacant scribe's post with ex-GFA member, Major yaw Larsen.
The paper says the two candidates,
according to grapevine sources, officially applied for Agra's positions about a
forth-night and a half ago.
W.K. Agra who presented his handing
over notes to his boss Ben Koufie, last Tuesday was asked to vacate office days
after a new GFA was elected into office last month.
Major Larsen, among others, was a
member of the three-man Interim Management Committee (IMC) headed by Joe
Lartey, a legal practitioner in 1991.
Their brief spell with
administration powered the Black Stars to a Silver medal at the Senegal' 92
Nations Cup Championship.
That not withstanding, high-placed
sources say Ebo Quansah, a journalist and a sports critic, already has the job
in his hand though yet to be endorsed with an appointment letter.
GRi…/
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The
Chronicle
If I were
autocratic…
Attorney
General and Minister of Justice Nana Akufo-Addo on Wednesday said if he were to
invoke the powers vested in him by the Constitution, media personnel with
"the Palaver" and "The Democrat" will have problems in this
country given the kind of stories they write, which are not only injurious to
the presidency but also to himself and his office.
The Chronicle writes that the remarks, which
formed part of the AG's concluding note of the debate on the repeal of the
Criminal Libel and Seditious laws was against the background of attacks by
sections of the NDC minority against the private newspapers, without any
reference to the conduct of the said newspapers.
He said by presenting the bill
before Parliament, the NPP has demonstrated not only its commitment to its
promise to repeal the law, but also the concerns of many who had, over the
years, called its expunction. The NDC government, Akufo Addo noted, has refused
to repeal the law, and had instead, excessively applied it against journalists.
He urged the NDC minority to move
away from its past and come along with the NPP in repealing the law, saying
this would enable the House to write a history that will leave footprints for
this country.
On the argument that the National
Media Commission (NMC) be given the necessary powers to make it effective and
up to its task, Akufo Addo said he does not want to interfere in the matter as
the Commission knows the necessary steps to take on that issue.
More…/
Sankofa
abused state resources
The
Chronicle says the unexplained circumstances surrounding the closure of Sankofa
Aero Club, an elite flying school closely associated with former President
Jerry Rawlings, is emerging, weeks after the facility was shut down by armed
troopers.
It has surfaced that operators of
the club who are close associates of the ex-President commandeered Ghana Air
Force (GAF) equipment like aircraft and other state property for the benefit of
the school even though the revenue generated went into private pockets.
The school is being operated by a
group of serving and retired air force personnel. Rawlings is the chief patron of the club Group Captain Richard
Forjoe and Air Commodore Kwame Mamphey both close associate of Rawlings are
President and Secretary of the governing council respectively.
The Chronicle says it can confirm
that five Micro-Lite aircraft, known in aviation circles as Cessnas together
with aviation fuel belonging to GAF were being used by the school for its
training programmes. The aircraft are presently packed at the club's hangars.
Chronicle says it further learnt
during investigations that the club was represented to the New Patriotic Party
(NPP) government, as a pet project of GAF. But, the government is yet to see
official receipts of revenue generated by the club and the payment of royalties
to the State for use of the facilities.
The land on which the school is
sited located at Afienya, some 15 miles away from the industrial city of Tema
is also government land, according to the Chronicle.
The former gliding school
established by Ghana's first President Kwame Nkrumah, operated from the
premises.
The closure was, therefore, to
afford national security gain a first hand appraisal of the operations of the
elite club, which until the closure was the playground of high rollers of
society, military sources confirmed to the Chronicle.
Also packed in the hangar is a
Cessna donated to the Ghana Wildlife Department by the Friends of Animals (FOA)
of the Konklobi Island monkey sanctuary fame through an Israeli NGO.
Students of the school pay-between
$500 - $600 a term for the Private Pilot Licensing Certificate, (PPLC).
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Minister's
fate in the balance
The Central
Regional Minister, Isaac Edumadze, on Tuesday came out of the President's
office at the Castle, Osu, dejected, with a drawn face, says The Evening News
The Minister, whose recent behaviour
hit the headlines and became a source of worry to the government and the
leadership of the party was summoned by the President to the Castle.
Mr Edumadze was with the President
for about 45 minutes, and when he finally emerged from the President's office,
he walked briskly past his friends and media correspondents at the Castle who
attempted to talk to him.
The usual smiles of the minister were absent,
as he looked sad and disturbed, a situation, which according to the paper,
suggests that something unpalatable might have been communicated to him.
Sources close to the Presidency,
hinted that the Regional Minister was summoned to answer his role in the
incident in which he ordered his driver to seize a taxi from Suhum to his
residence at Cape Coast.
The taxi was driven off by the
Minister's driver on his orders after his personal bodyguard fired warning
shots that sent the taxi driver and the passengers running for their dear lives
into the nearby bushes.
According to the sources, the
President expressed disgust at the behaviour of the Minister and warned those
in public office whose acts and omissions would cause embarrassment and
disaffection and bring the name of the government into disrepute to think
twice.
The sources, however could not tell
immediately whether any punitive action would be taken against Mr Edumadze.
Since the incident occurred on July
15,2001, members of the public have condemned the Minister's behaviour and
called on the government to institute a probe into the matter.
More…/
'Ato Dadzie
disbursed ¢2 billion to farmers'
Mr Austia
Gamey, a former Deputy Minister of Employment and Social Welfare, this morning
told the Fast Track High Court, that Nana Ato Dadzie, the former chief of
Staff, disbursed over ¢2 billion to resettle farmers at Bakpa in the Volta
Region, where the rice farm belonging to Quality Grain Company is sited.
The Evening News reports that Mr Gamey, who is
also the former MP for North Tongu where the farm is located, was testifying in
the case in which Mr Ibrahim Adam, former Minister of Agriculture and five
other public officials of the previous government are being tried for
conspiracy and willfully causing financial loss of over 22 millin dollars to
the state.
Led in evidence by Mr Osafo Sampong,
Director of Public Prosecution (DPP), Mr Gamey said sometime in 1997, he was
instructed by Mr Ibrahim Adam to take Mrs Rene Cotton (Woodard) of the Quality
Grain Company to meet the chiefs in the Aveyime Area to secure a plot of land for
rice farming.
Accompanied by the Direct Chief
Executive, Mr F.A.T. Dei-Zaga, they succeeded in getting land for Mrs Cotton
but she claimed it was not suitable for rice cultivation.
Mr Gamey said he was later informed
on telephone by Mrs. Cotton that she had found another site at Bakpa between
North Tongu and South Tongu constituencies where she had started a rice
cultivation.
Mr Gamey said she got to know that
the agreement between the Ghana government and Mrs Cotton was that she was to
provide some funding for which the government would provide the guarantee.
Witness said he was the chairman of
an adhoc committee tasked to ensure that Quality Grain Company got access to
the land.
According to him, the committee,
which was composed of people like Dr Sikpa Yankey and Mr Vicent Assiseh, former
NDC Press Secretary met over 70 times and managed to resettle the people who
were dotted on the land after protracted difficulties.
He said the committee was in touch
with Nana Ato Dadzie who was in charge of a sub-committee which disbursed over
¢2 billion for the resettlement of the people.
Mr Gamey said ¢7 million was also
made available to compensate for people whose shrine and churches were removed.
Witness explained that it was only
the rice mills, silos and other equipment that were sited at Aveyime and that
the rice farm itself was at Bakpa.
Answering questions under cross
examinations by Mr Samuel Cudjoe, Counsel for Mr Ibrahim Adam, witness said he
was aware that some rice cultivated by Quality Grain had already been
harvested.
He said he could not report on the
present situation as the government had ordered a suspension of work at the
site.
The court later adjourned to Tuesday
July 30 at the instance of the defence counsel who pleaded for time to study a
report on Quality Grain submitted to the government by Mr Gamey on behalf of
his committee.
More…/
Odoi Sykes
made envoy
The
President has in consultation with the Council of State, appointed nine
individuals as Ambassadors and High Commissioners.
A statement from the presidency
today named the them as Mr Samuel Odoi Sykes, Chairman, New Patriotic Party,
Roland Issifu Alhassan, a Tamale-based Lawyer and former running mate to
Professor Adu Boahen and Professor Albert Owusu Sarpong, Dean, Social Studies
KNUST.
Others are Professor Timothy Kwaku
Amesimeku, Legal Practitioner, Dr Baffour Agyei Bawuah, Chairman NPP, UK branch
and Development Consultant and Tahil Abdel Razak Muhiddeen Hassan, Lecturer,
University of Ghana.
The rest are Mr Emmanuel Kojo Adu
former Chairman, Asante Kotoko, Major-General (Rtd) Francis Yahaya Mahama,
former General Officer Commanding the Southern Command, Ghana Armed Forces and
Mr. Clarus Kwabena Sekyi, a Career Diplomat.
GRi…/
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NDC MPS
vote against Dev.
The
Majority in Parliament on Wednesday had a shock of their lives when the entire
membership of the minority voted against the resolution to adopt the finance
committee's report on the development credit agreement between the government
of Ghana and the international Development association (IDA), writes The
Independent.
The credit agreement is for an
amount of Special Drawing Right (SDR) 87,700,000, which is equivalent to
$110,000,000.
The money is to be used to finance
the Third Economic Reform Support Operation (ERSO III).
When the vote was taken on the
resolution to set aside standing Order 80(1) to enable the house adopt the
report yesterday, 677 Majority members voted in favour while 63 of the Minority
group voted against.
The resolution needed approval by at
least 101 members for the report of the committee to be adopted to pave way for
a speedy approval by the House of the loan agreement.
After the voting, the Speaker, Mr
Peter Ala Adjetey declared that the resolution could not be adopted as it
failed to receive the support of the required 101 votes in favour.
More…/
Atta Mills
refutes our publication
The
Independent reports that a member of the former Vice President Atta Mills'
team, which was at an NDC zonal meeting at Winneba has denied aspects of The
Independent's front page story captioned "NDC IS A Divided HOUSE" -
Atta Mills, published in the Wednesday July 25, 2001 edition of the paper.
According to Mr. Allotey Jacobs the
headline of the said report did not convey the exact import of what the former
Vice President said at the meeting.
According to him what Prof. Mills
meant was that too much bickering form the top hierarchy of the NDC party to
the grassroots will never augur will for the party "if we should take over
the reigns of government in 2004".
Mr Jocobs was of the view that our
reporter might have misconstrued all these aspects of the former Vice
President's speech because he spoke in Fante, his local dialect.
He denied that former Vice President
Mills ever said "although some individuals in the NDC regime corrupted
themselves, it was not the intention of the party as an institution to conspire
to loot the national coffers" as part of the paper's report stated.
"What he rather said was that
the NPP government is deliberately painting ex-NDC Ministers as corrupt
people", Mr Jacobs declared.
He also said the former Vice
President made it clear that the NPP is only distracting attention to justify
their own failures and that the NDC never had any intention of looting the
national coffers.
GRi…/
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Arthur,
Yeboah also deserve honour
The
Ghanaian Voice says with the imminent exhumation and reburial of selected
executed military officers, a call has gone to the government to also handover
the bodies of Arthur and Yeboah to their families.
The two were executed after an
abortive attempt to overthrow the National Liberation Council (NLC) government,
which overthrew the CPP in 1967.
The abortive coup, which was
primarily aimed at overthrowing the Kotoka and Afrifa - led Regime was
programmed to bring back Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah from Guinea.
The two, Lt. Arthur and 2nd
Lt. Yeboah were court martialed and executed for leading the coup which also
claimed the life of general E.K. Kotoka who was the architect of the military
putsch that overthrew Nkrumah.
Family sources told the Ghanaian
Voice" that if for nothing at all, monuments and statues should be erected
to immortalize the memory of those who took arms against the illegal military
regime.
"We know who are villains of
Ghana Politics, and we are aware who is now called the hero and his body is
going to be exhumed and reburied. We also have suffered if Afrifa and co are
going to be glorified for whatever reasons we also demand restitution for our
fathers who were killed because they stood against an imposition" said two
family spokesmen.
More…/
Police
woman victimized
The
Ghanaian Voice writes in another story that many Ghanaians seem to be asking if
ex-President JJ Rawlings does not have enough good reason to express his
feelings on the treatment being meted out to people close to him and the NDC by
the NPP administration.
The latest victim of the NPP
government's intimidation of people perceived to be close to the former
President is a Police Corporal who until recently had been part of the security
outfit of the ex-President, according to the paper.
The Corporal's crime was that she
visited Rawlings's office while she was still on leave. For this, the Police
administration by a wireless message recalled her from her 42-day leave and
asked her to proceed on transfer to Techiman, effective last Friday July 20.
The Corporal had commenced her leave
around the 9th of July, but had to go to her duty post at the
ex-President's office at Ridge to pick some documents she left behind.
Little did she know that her colleagues on
security detail around the Ex-President's residence would report her to their
bosses at the Headquarters (HQ).
A wireless message, signed by one
P.K. Acheampong from the CID HQ was flashed ordering the immediate transfer of
the Corporal to Techiman in the Brong-Ahafo Region. The transfer was to be
effect Friday, July 20 and in her place a Sergeant was to be moved from
Techiman to CID HQ in Accra.
GRi…/
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¢28Bn tax
evasion
The
Crusading Guide writes that Godka Group Ltd, owned by Kwashie Anagbo (alis
Patron), an acquaintance of ex-President Rawlings, has managed to escape the
eyes of Customs, Excise and Preventive Service (CEPS) over the company's
refusal to pay duty to the tune of ¢28 billion.
Kwashie Anagbo had allegedly
connived with one Nettey, a Custom Official (now on interdiction) to open up a
Bonded Warehouse, which had been locked by both parties CEPS and GODKA for
stocktaking to be conducted. Anagbo was said to have fraudulently managed to
secure the keys to the Warehouse kept by CEPS and removed most of the goods
from it without paying Custom duties on them. He (Anagbo) was arrested by CEPS
but later given bail by the service.
Though Kwashie Anagbo, said to be
the NDC financier for Volta Region was allegedly spotted in the company of some
ladies in one of the charlets of the Luxurious La-Palm Royal Beach Hotel a few
weeks ago, no attempt has been made by the present CEPS management to retrieve
the money.
The Company deals in canned foods. Two years ago when the CEPS officials took
stock at their Warehouse, (A/160 and A/89) and discovered the removal of some
goods from the Warehouse without payment of duty, CEPS slapped a penalty of ¢22
billion on the over ¢6 billion tax evasion by GODKA making the total liability
¢28 billion.
More…/
CPP is not
an opportunistic party
A leading
member of the Nkrumaist Convention People's Party (CPP), Dr Vladimir Antwi
Danso, has stated clearly that the party is not an opportunistic one as being
perceived by a section of the Ghanaian public, reports The Crusading Guide.
The CPP top contended that it was
not a bad idea that some of that party's members were now serving in the New
Patriotic Party (NPP) government, as they are serving Mother Ghana.
Dr Antwi Danso made these
observations in an exclusive interview with The Crusading Guide at his Legon
Centre for International Affairs (LECIA) office in Accra.
The Lecturer cum politician noted
that the resolution of the deplorable economic legacy which the NPP
administration inherited from the National Democratic Congress (NDC) Government
required the commitment of all Ghanaians, irrespective of their political,
ethnic and religious backgrounds, and this in his view, compelled the CPP
members to accept the request by Kufuor to serve in his government.
Concerning the proposed alliance
between the Convention People's Party (CPP), the National Reform Party (NRP),
Great Consolidated Popular Party (GCPP) and the People's National Convention
(PNC), Dr. Danso urged the parties in the ongoing negotiations to place the
interest of Mother Ghana first to ensure that the negotiations succeed.
GRi…/
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HIPC is
dangerous for Ghana
Jubilee
2000 Africampaign Ghana says it regret the decision of the NPP government to
force Ghana to join the HIPC initiative without expert advice, according to a
Ghanaian Democrat report.
"Unfortunately, the HIPC
initiative that the new administration has accessed does not offer any real
possibilities of taking us out of the crisis of development", said Mr
Kwame Dudzoe, National Co-ordinator for Jubilee 2000.
He was addressing a news conference
in Accra to register the organisation's displeasure about President J.A.
Kufuor's declaration of Ghana as a HIPC country.
Mr Dudzoe stressed that HIPC is in
fact not aimed at helping Ghana achieve debt sustainability, as its professed
objective proclaims.
He disclosed that the whole purpose
of HIPC seeks to keep our government and the economy locked up even more firmly
within the economic paradigm of structural adjustment and neo-liberal
conditionalities.
"Days before its spring meeting
in Washington DC, the World Bank and IMF released an internal paper which
finally raised deep concerns about debt sustainability after the HIPC
initiative and effectively abandons the original article of faith that HIPC was
an effective response to the challenges of debt sustainability," Mr Dudzoe
emphasised, saying that the NPP government had denied the real opportunity of
considering alternative for HIPC.
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VAT Service
to end tax on essential drugs
Mr Joseph
O. Blankson, Commissioner of the Value Added Tax (VAT) Service said on Tuesday
that the service would immediately stop imposing VAT on essential drugs as soon
as the minister of Health makes such a list available, according to an Accra
Mail repot.
"We are aware that the Minster
of Health is working on the list of special drugs to be exempted form VAT. As
soon as it is available, the VAT service will not waste time in its
implementation," Mr Blankson told a meeting in Accra with officials of the
service, pharmacists, importers and wholesalers of finished pharmaceutical
products.
The meeting was to discuss the
relevant sections of the VAT (Amendment) Act, 2001 (Act 595) and what was
expected of importers of finished pharmaceutical products with respect to
registration and compliance.
A major issue raised at the meting
was the definition of essential drugs to be determined by the Health Minister
and approved by Parliament. At the re-introduction of the VAT Act of 1998, (Act
546) such drugs were initially exempted from tax.
The list at the time was defined
mainly for the purpose of procurement of the major pharmaceutical products for
the Ministry of Health, but an appropriate definition was not reached for its
successful implementation for taxation purposes.
Mr Blankson said the VAT placed
domestic producers at a competitive disadvantage as local manufactures still
paid VAT on packaging materials required for the production of pharmaceutical
products.
Importers of finished products,
meanwhile, had the entire cost, insurance and freight (CIF) of their finished
products exempted from VAT, but local manufacturers did not have any means of
recovering the VAT paid on their imports.
Some local manufacturers, finding
importing of finished pharmaceutical products more lucrative, moved into
imports.
Mr Blankson said a mechanism that
would benefit local manufacturers was decided on and taken care of in the VAT
Amendment Act 2001, (Act 595) which received presidential assent in April this
year.
More…/
A
successful summit
The Accra
Mail says all too soon the Homecoming Summit towards which much energy and
resources were expended by the government, the private sector and citizens has
found a comfortable place in the chapters of history.
The 'Akwaba', which preceded the start of the
historical event has given way to 'Nantiyie' as the Ghanaians in the Diaspora
who graced the occasion head for their various destinations. The response to
the call by an economically distressed country to her sons and daughters living
abroad to come to her aid underscores our determination as a people to
disentangle ourselves from the self-inflicted economic mess we have found
ourselves in.
All those who ensured its success
should be patted on the back for a job well done. The resolutions reached
during the summit should not be kept on the shelves but given executive bite so
that our seriousness can be appreciated by those we expect to invest in the
country, for after all, that was the objective of the whole endeavour. It would
also be helpful if periodic assessment of the impact of the summit would be
undertaken to improve future summits.
The Accra Mail wishes all who turned
up for the great event a safe journey back to their destinations and to those
of us at home, we say, "let the House flourish."
GRi…/
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