Cocoa price up
BNI has power of arrest
Ivorian President in town
Racist boss punished
We’ll retrieve stolen wealth
Low cost housing for teachers soon
Mallam Isa fails to appear in court
Akwasi Agyemang quits politics
Obed, Mahama lead NDC talks
The Quality Grain Scandal: Peprah & co for court
I have retired from politics – Akata Pore
Chronicle boss defends Jake suit against Graphic?
New Party to replace DPP
“0” Tolerance for Corruption VAT makes money, But…
“NDC must not resurrect”
Maame Dokono says goodbye to politics
Pastor, Elder, fight over Usher in a Hotel
Cocoa price up
The Government has increased the producer price of cocoa for the 2001 light crop year from 217,187.50 cedis to 242,000 per bag or from 3,475,000 cedis to 3,872,000 per tonne, reports the Daily Graphic.
The new price, which represents an increase of 11 per cent over the previous main crop price fixed last October, is in line with government’s commitment to continue to support cocoa farmers to increase productivity and boost production.
A statement signed by the acting Chief Executive of the Ghana Cocoa Board, Mr S.K. Appah, and issued in Accra on Wednesday said subsequent to the price increase, the government had reviewed both the world cocoa market price and the domestic economic situation and their impact on cocoa farmers.
It recalled the statement made by the Minister of Finance when he presented the 2001 budget, which announced the government’s intention to pay compensation to cocoa farmers in respect of the 2000/2001 main crop season.
The minister explained at the time that half of the amount would be paid in cash, while the remaining half would be used to finance the mass spraying of cocoa farms throughout the country to control diseases and insect pests that plague cocoa farms.
More…/
BNI has power of arrest
The Bureau of National Investigations (BNI) has rejected the assertion that it has no power or authority to arrest any citizen when it becomes necessary.
It said Section 40 of the Security and Intelligence Agencies Act, (Act 526 of 1996), confers the power of arrest on the agency just as any other intelligence agency of the state.
The BNI was reacting to comments in recent media reports concerning the organisation’s power of arrest with particular reference to the arrest of Mr Victor Selormey, former Deputy Minister of Finance, which caused a furore.
It quoted Section 40 of Act 526 which states that: “Subject to the Constitution, an employee of any of the internal intelligence agency shall in the performance of his duty under this Act has the same rights and powers as are conferred by law on a police officer in the performance of his duties and shall have the same protection”.
It said the BNI was, therefore, acting within the law when its officers arrested Mr Selormey.
Meanwhile, a senior police intelligence officer has explained that when the power of arrest is conferred on an organisation, “an arrest can be effected anytime and anywhere”.
The officer said a security officer does not take the status of the person to be arrested into consideration before an arrest is effected.
GRi…/
Send your comments to news@ghanareview.com
Ivorian President in town
The President of La Cote d’Ivoire, Mr Laurent Gbagbo, arrived in Accra on Wednesday at the head of a 25-member delegation for a two-day state visit to Ghana, reports the Ghanaian Times.
Mr Gbagbo, accompanied by his wife, Simore, was met on arrival at the Kotoka International Airport by President John Agyekum Kufuor and his wife Theresa, and Vice-President Alhaji Aliu Mahama.
After the national anthems of Ghana and Cote d’Ivoire were played, the Ivorian President inspected a Guard of Honour mounted by personnel of the Airforce Base amidst a 21-gun salute.
President Kufuor then introduced the Ministers of State, parliamentarians, Service Commanders, the Diplomatic Corps and other government officials who were present.
President Gbagbo was mobbed by members of the Ivorian community who thronged the airport to welcome him.
During his stay he will hold bilateral talks with President Kufuor on Cote d’Ivoire-Ghana relations and address the Ivorian Community.
The Ivorian leader is also expected to call on the Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, at the Manhyia Palace, Kumasi, where a durbar of chiefs would be held in his honour.
More…/
Racist boss punished
The management of Pipes and Plastic Products Limited has suspended its Production Engineer for an inhuman treatment of one of the workers.
The Engineer, J.B. Bhave, an Indian, was said to have forced the worker, Mr Martin K. Owusu, to lick his sputum from the factory floor, which was covered by chemicals.
Bhave is on two weeks suspension after submitting written apologies to Mr Owusu and the entire workforce for his conduct.
Sources at the factory told the ‘Times’ that a pipe at the plant burst and hazardous chemical spurt out into Mr Owusu’s mouth. Mr Owusu spat it out onto the floor but Bhave, who was standing nearby, instead of showing concern, rather got angry and rained insults on him for spitting on the floor.
Bhave gave Owusu two options: “be prepared to receive slaps or use your tongue to clean the waste from the floor”.
Owusu, fearing to lose his job, chose the latter. He knelt down and licked the sputum and the chemical waste on the floor.
Mr Raja V. Swaminathan, General Manager of the company confirmed the incident to the ‘Times’ in Accra on Wednesday but said the issue had been settled amicably.
GRi…/
Send your comments to news@ghanareview.com
We’ll retrieve stolen wealth
The New Patriotic Party (NPP) is gearing itself to win the economic war confronting the nation according to the Evening News.
For a start, the party intends to hunt down all those who have used their political positions to amass illegal wealth at the expense of the state and the good people of Ghana.
“The naïve notion that we should save the NDC from their guilty feeling and reconcile this nation by extending goodwill (to them) and sweeping (their) evil deeds under the carpet is not only, but also, dangerous”, says Kwadwo Afari, Press Secretary of the NPP.
According to Mr Afari, the NPP administration inherited an external debt of $5.8 billion while the domestic debt left behind for the government to grapple with was $1.7 billion.
Speaking in an interview with the paper in Accra on Wednesday, the NPP Press Secretary explained that the debt stock represented 224 per cent of exports and 709 per cent of budget revenue respectively.
“Contrary to what the NDC would want us to believe, the NPP was forced by the bad economic conditions inherited from the Rawlings’ government to take the painful but necessary HIPC initiative”, says Mr Afari.
He reminded all right thinking Ghanaians to note the subtle manoeuvres by NDC to divert public attention from the socio-economic issues confronting the country in order to scuttle President Kufuor’s attempt to trace, recover and repatriate public funs suspected to have been looted by NDC functionaries and stashed away in foreign banks.
More…/
Low cost housing for teachers soon
The acute housing problem facing workers, especially teachers within the Accra metropolis would be considerably reduced within the next four months if a pilot project initiated by the Ghana National Association of Teachers (GNAT) proves successful.
AVELTION (GH) Company Limited, private developers, have been contracted by GNAT to provide about 1,300 housing units to its members, using the latest technology.
The project is cited at Millennium City, Nyanyano, near Kasoa in the Central Region and involves the construction of single, two and three bedroom accommodation.
When successful, GNAT hopes to extend the facility to its members in the other regions at what was described as “cheapest cost”.
GRi…/
Send your comments to news@ghanareview.com
Mallam Isa fails to appear in court
The former Minister for Youth and Sports, Mallam Yusif Isa who was scheduled to appear before the Greater Accra Regional Tribunal last Monday April 30th failed to turn up writes The Independent.
His failure to turn up was explained as having sent in an excuse duty from his doctor to the police and the tribunal that he was indisposed and as such not fit to stand trial last Monday.
He is therefore, to appear before the tribunal on Wednesday, May 9, 2001.
A source at the registry of the Greater Accra Regional Tribunal told The Independent that, Mallam Yusif Isa was scheduled to have appeared before the Tribunal, but were later informed that the case had been rescheduled for Wednesday, May 9th, 2001.
More…/
Akwasi Agyemang quits politics
Former Kumasi Metropolitan Chief Executive, Nana Akwasi Agyemang a.k.a. Okumkom after almost four months silence after the general elections, has come out to state clearly that he is out of politics.
He believes after 23 years service to the metropolitan assembly, it is high time he took a back stage to reflect on his achievements and shortcomings over the years, which has been terrible especially in the latter part of the last decade.
Nana Akwasi Agyemang who was speaking to reporters however said, he will not refuse to offer advice to the New NPP government when the need arises adding that the (P) NDC has not been the only government he has served with all his heart.
He was quick to add that he is not hiding behind the statement that he will offer advice to the government to lobby for any appointment in JAK’s administration.
Nana Akwasi Agyemang who during the latter part of his career was appointed a special envoy to former President, Rawlings earned the name Okumkom due to his generosity to the poor but also gained notoriety for his aim of beating taxi drivers, harassing traders and putting fear into members of the Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly (KMA).
GRi…/
Send your comments to news@ghanareview.com
Obed, Mahama lead NDC talks
The Chronicle says two of the biggest names in the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Alhaji Mahama Iddrissu and Dr. Obed Asamoah on Wednesday led re-organisation talks at Maple Leaf Hotel, Accra in an atmosphere that suggested that the two heavyweights who were at each other’s throat in the race for the Vice Presidency had buried the hatchet.
“It was a depressingly low voltage meeting devoid of the pomp and ceremony that accompany NDC meetings of this nature – a national meeting attended by members from all regions and constituencies in the country. The National Re-organsation meeting.” Most people attended late and came without party paraphernalia.
The agenda was party re-organisation and constituency spokesman after spokesman showed unusual candour and freely aired their mind, blaming their election defeat on lack of internal democracy. The dictatorial tendencies of the party were completely gone and the threatening repressive shadow of Rawlings or Mrs. Konadu appeared to have evaporated.
GRi…/
Send your comments to news@ghanareview.com
The Quality Grain Scandal: Peprah & co for court
A source close to the office of the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, has hinted “The Crusading Guide” that Mr Kwame Peprah, Ex-Minister of Finance and others are going to be prosecuted for causing a huge financial loss to the State in connection with the Quality Grain scandal.
Others to be prosecuted with him are Nana Ato Dadzie, Messrs Ibrahim Adam, Dapaah and Geoge Yankey.
More…/
I have retired from politics – Akata Pore
One of the key figures of the June 4, 1979 uprising, which launched Flt. Lt. Jerry John Rawlings on to the political scene for the first time, Sgt. Anloga Akata Pore (rtd), has announced his retirement from politics.
The main reason he assigned for his decision was that Rawlings, who was the Chairman of the defunct Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC), the erstwhile Provisional National Defence Council (PNDC) and former President of the 4th Republic of Ghana, had disillusioned him (Akata Pore).
According to Sgt. Akata Pore (rtd), one thing Rawlings had taken out of him is trust.
The former AFRC man, who is in exile in London, made the assertion in an interview with the Editor-in-Chief of The crusading Guide, Kweku Baako Jnr. when the latter paid him a visit in London during his (Baako’s) one-month stay in Cardiff, Wales.
GRi…/
Send your comments to news@ghanareview.com
Chronicle boss defends Jake suit against Graphic?
The Daily Guide carries that the publisher of the Ghanaian Chronicle, an independent daily newspaper on Wednesday defended the 100m cedis suit slapped on the Daily Graphic, a state-owned newspaper by Mr Jake Obetsebi-Lamptey Minister of Presidential Affairs and Chief of Staff.
Mr Kofi Coomson, who was speaking on a Joy FM programme, the Super Morning Show hosted by Komla Dumor on the occasion of this year’s Press Freedom Day that falls on May 3, said that the Graphic has enjoyed a long honeymoon with officialdom, and that this is the time to tell it that the honeymoon is over.
Also on the programme were Mrs Gifty Affenyi-Dadzie, President of the Ghana Journalists Association (GJA) and Mr Kwesi Pratt Jnr, Editor, publisher of the Weekly Insight.
Reacting on the responsibility of the Ghanaian Journalist up to date, Mr Kofi Coomson said the Daily Graphic published by the Graphic Communications Group, was irresponsible by publishing an allegation made by the Minority leader in Parliament, Mr. Alban S.K. Bagbin alleging that Mr. Jake Obetsebi-Lamptey has awarded a contract for 1.9 million cedis on the Castle renovation work, to his private company.
“Graphic could have crosschecked with Jake Obetsebi-Lamptey easily which the paper did not do and therefore Jake is right to defend his rights and reputation”, Kofi Coomson said.
GRi…/
Send your comments to news@ghanareview.com
New Party to replace DPP
The Ghanaian Democrat writes that the Democratic People’s Party (DPP), a member of the Progressive Alliance that contested and won the 1992, 1996 elections but lost that of 2000 has finalised preparations to dissolve itself and form a more pragmatic political party to contest the 2004 election with more vigour.
The motto of the new party which will be outdoored on Republic Day this year will be: “Righteousness, Peace and Development.”
Giving details of the significance of the new motto, a source close to the DPP headquarters in Accra said that until the whole “country turn to righteousness, peace would be elusive and real development will be a mirage.”
The source emphasised that the time has come for each and every citizen to ask himself or herself what he or she can contribute to the peace and tranquillity the country has enjoyed for the past years.
Democrat’s sources can reveal also that the former President, Flt. Lt. J.J. Rawlings and the former Atorney General and Minister of Justice, Dr. Obed Asamoah are all aware of the formation of the new political party.
GRi…/
Send your comments to news@ghanareview.com
“0” Tolerance for Corruption VAT makes money, But…
The Accra Mail says when the Minister for Finance, Mr Yaw Osafo Maafo returns from the US on Thursday, he would meet an ebullient VAT Secretariat, but with a problem of its own.
One of the tangible gains of the Kufuor administration’s 100 days in office is an increase in the revenue intake of the VAT Secretariat according to the Mail which says it has learnt from highly placed sources that the secretariat has already exceeded its projections for the first quarter of the 2001 fiscal year.
Because the figures at his stage are still under confidential wrap, the sources said it would not be tactical to divulge them but they gave around 10% as the percentage increase over the figures of last year at the same time.
The VAT projection in the 2001 budget is 1,739.7 billion cedis representing 4.6% of GDP.
Asked about the reasons for such an increase, one of the sources confessed, “You know, the President’s zero tolerance for corruption seems to be doing the trick”.
The retiring VAT boss, Mr Asamoah himself was not available for comment efforts were made to contact him.
But even with this ebullience, there are grumblings at the VAT headquarters that the imminent imposition of a new head to take over from the present Commissioner, Mr Asamoah, may affect morale and thereby also bring down enthusiasm which no doubt will also affect productivity.
The Minister of Finance would have to announce this week a replacement for Mr Asamoah and the name that has come up as a possibility is that of Mr Seth Tekper, a former employee of VAT but now working at the IMF offices in Wahington DC. His name has however raised hackles in the different echelons of the VAT secretariat.
GRi…/
Send your comments to news@ghanareview.com
“NDC must not resurrect”
One of the firebrands of Ghanaian journalism, Mr Kweku Baako, has stated that much as he wants the National Democratic Congress (NDC) to exist as a political party, he would do everything in his capacity as a political activist to campaign against the party in any election, reports The Ghanaian Voice.
His decision was premised on what he termed the NDC’s fragmentation of the CPP family, a party he has strongly ascribed to.
Kwaku Baako, who is the editor of the Crusading Guide was speaking on a Metro TV current affairs programme, Good Evening Ghana last Tuesday night. Touching on a wide range of issues the Journalist of the year 2000 stated that having lost the elections last December despite having the advantages of incumbency and docile District Assemblies to do its bidding, the NDC had lost the oxygen to marshal any forces for a meaningful showing at any polls.
GRi…/
Send your comments to news@ghanareview.com
Maame Dokono says goodbye to politics
Maame Dokono has said goodbye to politics. She made her decision known on Joy FM’s Weekend City Show last Saturday, according to a Graphic Showbiz story.
Already, Maame Dokono’s (a.k.a Grace Omaboe) decision is being hailed by a number of theatre lovers, many of whom are fans of her’s, who believe that her decision to go into politics was a mistake from the very start.
Miss Grace Omaboe, the very popular actress and radio and television programmes hostess, has over the years won a great deal of admiration for her roles on stage, television and recently as a women’s and children’s rights activist.
Then last year, suddenly like a bombshell dropped from nowhere, she offered to stand as a parliamentary candidate for the National Democratic Congress party in the Birim North constituency.
She told Felix Vanderpallen, host of the Joy Weekend City Show, that she decided to go into politics because she realised that only a handful of women were into politics, especially as parliamentarians and she thought that was unacceptable since she believed women can best address the many problems that revolve around them and children.
When the host asked her why she is now saying goodbye to politics, she lamented: “Politics is in fact a dirty game” and narrated how she is now intimidated by some people in her area.
Even in Accra, she said, she encounters unpleasant situations when people ridicule and hoot at her when sometimes they see her. “Some even go to the extent of insulting me,” she told her host.
GRi…/
Send your comments to news@ghanareview.com
Pastor, Elder, fight over Usher in a Hotel
Residents of Chorkor, a suburb of Accra, and is surrounding areas are in a dilemma over the actual reason why a pastor and an elder of St Peters Sanctuary, a revered church in that community, were engaged in a fierce fight at a hotel last Sunday, April 22, 2001 at about 8:30 pm.
They are also labouring over the pastor’s allegation that the elder, a married man, snatched his (pastor’s) girlfriend, an usher of their church.
Speaking to P & P, an attendant of the hotel (name withheld) located at Chorkor, said for about a month now, the elder had been visiting the hotel in the company of the beautiful young woman. He disclosed that nothing was suspected until that night when the elder was attacked by the pastor when he was with the girl at the hotel. He said, the pastor got down hurriedly from a taxi and ran into the hotel, and walked straight to them.
“They started an argument which later developed into a fight. We had a very hard time separating them,” he said.
Sources said the fight attracted a crowd to the scene including neighbours and the elder was compelled to bolt in his car when he noticed that the crowd had intensified to feast their hungry eyes on hem.
It was a sour spectacle as they hooted at him while he drove off. They chuckled, laughed and warned him to be careful as he was a professed man of God.
To escape the embarrassment, the woman in the centre of the whole drama bolted before she could be noticed.
P & P investigations disclosed that both Pastor Paul Agyin, 36, and elder Yartey 53, are members of the same church at Gbegbeisei, Shiabu, near Chorkor, Accra.
About 3 months ago Pastor Agyin introduced into their church Ms Bles Amegee, 22, a seamstress after he had met and befriended her. About two weeks ago, he had gone to visit her, but was told she had been taken out by an elderly man and this aroused his suspicion. Through investigations, he was hinted that his sweetheart had been visiting the said hotel with an elderly man.
Following this, he wasted no time to chase them up when he met her absence on the evening of April 22 and found them together.
When traced, Pastor Agyin said he had forgiven the women but had quit from the church and is contemplating starting his own.
GRi…/
Send your comments to news@ghanareview.com