GRi Business, Economics & Finance 03 –
03 - 2003
Gomoa-Kumasi (Central Region)
The purpose of organizing the
Association was to ensure that more farmers in the catchment
areas of the Awutu-Bawjiase Industrial Starch Factory,
which is expected to go into production later in the year, produce adequate raw
materials to sustain the factory when it goes into full business.
Bennet Yaw Ehuron,
national organizer of the Association and secretary to the Gomoa
District branch, announced the agreement at a quarterly meeting of the Gomoa district branch at Gomoa-Kumasi.
He said,
instalments of members who would benefit from the loans scheme would be
deducted at source from the returns of their respective farms to keep the
scheme going.
Ehuron commended the national president
of the Association, J.K Dodd, for his foresight and sense of purpose and
commitment to the goals of farmers. I.K. Arhin, Gomoa district chairman of the Association and Justice K. Odoom, executive officer, advised members to maintain and
expand their farms to enable the Gomoa District to
lead in the production of industrial starch cassava production to feed the
Ayensu Starch Factory all-year-round.
Arhin expressed optimism that the loans
scheme would attract more farmers in the Gomoa district
to join the Association. Earlier, Mr Dodd and his secretary,
briefed the meeting on plans towards the inauguration of the Association at Gomoa Ngyiresi on 7 March.
GRi.../
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Kumasi (Ashanti Region) 03 March
2003 - Cocoa farmers in Ashanti have expressed concern about the inadequate
supply of improved and high yielding pods by the Cocoa Breeding Centres for
planting and said this was inhibiting their efforts at raising production.
Nana
He made this known at a forum
held in
Another area of concern to the
farmers, he said, was the bad nature of some feeder roads leading to cocoa
growing communities. He therefore, appealed to the government to sustain its
feeder roads maintenance programme to ensure that farmers have easier access to
cocoa buying centres.
Meanwhile, the Ashanti GCCSFA
has established a welfare scheme to help cater for the needs of its members in
times of destruction of their farms and other property through disasters, hospitalisation
and bereavement. The farmers contribute 120,000 cedis annually towards the
operation of the scheme.
GRi.../
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
This, it said, would not only generate
employment for many more Ghanaians but would also earn government increased
revenue to fund more development projects. "We want the government to know
that the Banker to Banker has attracted a lot of patronage from the general
public and it should be accorded total recognition and its operations
controlled," said the petition signed by Ransford
Boama Boakye, Chairman of
the LAWU, and copied to the Ghana News Agency (GNA).
It noted that, with the huge
patronage of the DNL, the lotto industry grew to such an extent that it could
not fulfil stakers' demands, leading to a shortage of
lotto books and underhand deals by the DNL Receivers Union (DNL-RU).
This, the LAWU noted, led to the
era of supply of books by private individuals (Banker to Banker Operators) who used
the DNL winning numbers to pay their winners without paying tax.
The situation brought about a
misunderstanding between the Banker-to-Banker operators and the DNL until the
government legalised the operations of the former under PNDC Law 223.
The
The LAWU alleged that the practice
of the DNL-RU is, however, more of a liability now to the DNL as its members
seems to have taken total control of the lotto industry. It alleged that
instead of admitting new members to assist in their operations, members of the
RU have rather increased their stock which they in turn reallocate to the
so-called Banker to Banker operators at the rate of 10 to eight per cent while
they collect their stocks at the rate of 25 per cent from the DNL."
The petition said the DNL-RU, by
and large, mislead officials of the DNL and use the police to harass and arrest
members of the LAWU who refuse to kowtow to the corrupt practice of the
receivers.
It alleged that most of the
receivers do not have kiosks in which they operate their business and rather
resort to the service of agents and writers. The LAWU said again that the procedures
for payment at the DNL is frustrating to most stackers, adding that members of
the DNL-RU have constituted themselves into buyers of winnings tickets and
operate within the precincts of the DNL offices.
It alleged that while the
government pays 213,000 cedis for a 1,000 cedis winning coupon, these buyers
deceive winners into selling the coupons for 200,000 cedis or 180,000 cedis.
"Sometimes, they would send
your winning ticket for checking within the building and come back with some
flimsy excuses, thereby asking the winner to go and come back after two weeks
to collect their wins.''
"All these frustrations
drive stakers away from buying the DNL coupons,"
it stated, and appealed to the DNL authorities to drive away these buyers. The
LAWU said the popularity of the Banker to Banker makes it incumbent on the
authorities to take a serious look at the issue once again, adding that the DNL
and the Agents and Writers can co-exist, cooperate and in the process increase
the profits of the DNL and ultimately the revenue collected by
government."
"In this era of
privatisation, it is our prayer that the lotto industry is also opened up so
that the industry can benefit from the concept of private participation." "We
want to state it clear that with our workforce on the ground, we can pay five
times the tax that the Receivers Union are crying
over," it said.
The LAWU, therefore, appealed to
government to accord Banker-to-Banker and private lottery operators total
recognition, saying the Internal Revenue Service and the VAT Secretariat can
check the system.
"We therefore again appeal
to the Director of National Lotteries to invite the leaders of our
"We are very much worried
as a lot of money that could have been used for development goes to the drain,"
it added. Alex Baafour-Gyimah, Games Commissioner and
former Acting Director of the DNL, however, told the GNA that private operators
had abused the chance given them by PNDCL 223 that legalised their operations.
"There is
no way private lotto agents and writers can be allowed into the
operations of the DNL," he said, adding that their way of operation is not
regulated. Baafour-Gyimah said the DNL could,
however, give members of the LAWU the chance to become agents of the DNL.
He said the LAWU have their own
skilled employees who can be employed by the DNL to operate under its umbrella,
adding: "We even need more people because we are going to reach out to the
nook and cranny of the country to engage more agents for the DNL."
Asked how soon this could be
done, Baafour-Gyimah said this would be latest by 31 March
this year, after the requisite Act had been passed by Parliament. Reacting to
the allegations of delayed payments for winners,
Baafour-Gyimah agreed that the DNL
could not pay as fast as the Banker-to-Banker operators because it had to go
through the necessary processes of drawing up payment vouchers to be audited
before it could effect payment.
He said, however, that when he
assumed office, he introduced the necessary measures, including coming to work
even on Sundays to sign cheques, to ensure that winners are paid the following
Monday.
"We are doing our best
under the circumstances. If the private lotto writers were not around, there
would not be too much pressure on the DNL," he said. Baafour-Gyimah
agreed with the LAWU that individuals who buy winning coupons at a discount
were creating problems for the DNL but said he had given instructions that
these people should not operate within the precincts of the DNL.
Asked how best the DNL could
maximise its revenue, Mr Baafour-Gyimah said:
"The lotto business is making business everywhere except in
When the GNA called at the
offices of the Minister of Finance, neither he nor any of his two deputies was
available for their comments. However, Mr Yaw Osafo-Maafo, in his 2003 budget
statement to Parliament last Thursday, said the problems associated with
lotteries in
Consequently, he said, it was
being proposed to repeal PNDCL 223 with a view to outlawing the activities of
private lotteries. He said government was aware of the number of people
employed by private lotto operators and wished to assure the public that the restructured
and well-resourced DNL would be able to absorb lotto agents employed by private
lotto operators.
"Already numerous
applications have been submitted by agents of the private operators because of
the impending abolition of the law," he stated. Kwaw
Ansah, ex-employee of the DNL, told the GNA that
strict security checks were necessary to prevent deals among some employees that
had led to the dwindling fortunes of the DNL.
"Government should employ
qualified, patriotic, dedicated and trusted Ghanaians to oversee the operations
of the DNL to prevent corrupt deals, particularly among staff of the DNL in the
security section and the machine room to save the lotto industry from eminent
collapse," he added.
GRi.../
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com