Nduom replies Ahwoi
Assembly breaks 31st DWM grip and
removes 150 from payroll
Goosie calls foe probe of judges' murders
Mensah Otabil talks to Agenda
Ghana is to set up a special bank and an
educational and cultural centre in the United States to promote investment and
attract more tourists into the country, reports the Daily Graphic.
This was announced by Ghana’s Ambassador to the
US, Mr Alan Kyeremanten, at a reception held in his honour after presenting his
letter of credence to President George Bush at the White House. The reception
was also to introduce him to the executive and members of the Ghanaian
community in the US.
Mr Alan Kyeremanten expressed his appreciation,
saying the meeting with the community symbolises the commencement of his duties
as Ghana’s new representative.
He said the bank, the first of its kind to be
established in US will purposely be used to serve the Ghanaian community and
also attract more foreign investors for the country.
More…/
Nine foreign companies have been pre-qualified
to bid for participation in a partnership with Ghana Water Company Limited
(GWCL) to provide potable water in the country.
Out of the number, two of the companies will be
selected to operate in each of the two business units of the country.
The companies, which have been pre-qualified
for Business Unit ‘A’, which is the Greater Accra, Volta, Northern, Upper East
and Upper West regions are: Saur of France; SKANKAS of Sweden; International
Water, UK; NUON of Holland, Biwater, UK; Generale Des-Eaux and Suez Lynnaisse
Des-Eaux, both of France.
For Business Unit ‘B’, involving Brong Ahafo,
Western, Ashanti, Eastern and Central are: Saur of France: International Water
of UK; Vivendi of France and Northumbrain and Taylor Woodrow, also of UK.
Mr Emmanuel Nkrumah, Water Engineer of the
Water Sector Restructuring Secretariat of the Ministry of Works and Housing,
who disclosed this in an interview, said the actual bidding process will
commence in the middle of next year and it is expected to last for about four
months. He said bidding documents are being prepared after which the bids will
be opened.
Mr Nkrumah said even after the final two have
been selected, the sector ministry and the Attorney-General’s Department will
also have to carefully conduct an assessment of the companies after which the
result will be taken to Cabinet for onward submission to Parliament for final
approval.
He explained that the delays in the process,
although not deliberate, was to ensure that all the necessary concerns of
stakeholders, including the public and the operators, have been adequately
addressed.
He said the Public Utility and Regulatory
Commission (PURC) and the GWCL are instrumental in all the processes to ensure
that the benchmarks are well supervised and regulated.
More…/
It has now been established that the October 16
cyanide spillage that polluted the Huni and Asuman rivers near Tarkwa in the
Western Region resulted from the negligence of the Ghana Goldfields Limited.
Consequently, the Ministry of Environment and
Science is taking steps to ensure that the company pays compensation to the
affected communities.
Professor Dominic K. Fobih, the sector
minister, who disclosed this is in an interview in Accra, said investigations
by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) point to the negligence on the
part of the company.
The minister said the company’s assertion that
it was the detoxification exercise that led to the damage to aquatic life could
not be wholly true. He said if measures taken by the company resulted in the
damage, including rendering some fish species lifeless, it is an indication of
the inability of the company to contain such problems anytime they occur.
“If this is the case, then the mining firm did
not do well in containing the disaster,” the Minister said.
The minister, who did not elaborate on the form
of compensation or the amount to be paid to the affected communities, said they
would be compensated for the psychological, emotional and other sufferings that
resulted from the cyanide spillage.
He announced that a technical team is being
constituted to determine the systematic effects of the spillage and to provide
detailed assessment of the level of pollution or otherwise on the environment
and human health in general.
More…/
The Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority (GPHA)
lost an estimated 10 billion cedis in revenue from 1995 to 2000 due to the
occupation of four out of its eight berths at the fishing harbour by laid-up
fishing vessels.
The four berths fully occupied by about 28
vessels that are seaworthy cannot be used for any other operational or
commercial activity such as bunkering, crane and handling services. Some of the
vessels have been at the port since 1987.
In addition to this, the laid-up vessels owe
the authority a total of ¢6 billion in accumulated rent as at June this year.
The Fishing Harbour Manager, Mr Jim Fugah, made
this known when he briefed the Parliamentary Select Committee on Roads and
Transport during a familiarization tour of the port last Wednesday.
Referring to the problem of laid-up vessels as
a perennial one, Mr Fugah said a recent survey conducted on the vessels
revealed that 15 out of the lot are completely unserviceable. Seven out of the
15 vessels belong to two companies, Mankoadze and Infitco Fisheries.
Aside from the loss in revenue to the state,
the worthless vessels pose a danger to the quay walls due to excessive pressure
that can lead to structural failure.
More…/
Ghana loses between $150 million and $200
million of foreign exchange annually, as a result of disputes associated with
the country’s salts industry.
Although the country is a leading producer of
salt in the West African sub-region, the vast market potential of the industry
is not being tapped, “because the industries is not properly organised.”
Mr Abu-Bakar Saddique Boniface, Deputy Minister
of Trade and Industry, said in an interview in Accra on Thursday that, out of a
total demand of 1.47 million metric tones of salt in the sub-region, Ghana
produces 200,000.
He said countries such as Nigeria and Senegal,
which cannot meet their domestic salt demands, find it more convenient to make
up for the short-falls by importing salt from Brazil, India and Australia.
Mr Bonniface said the government is currently
taking urgent steps to reverse the fortunes of the industry.
GRi…/
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Nduom replies Ahwoi
The
Minister of Economic Planning and Regional Cooperation, Paa Kwesi Nduom, has
maintained that the Ghana Vision 2020 document was a long-term development,
which could not be a basis for the current development process.
According
to The Ghanaian Times, Dr Nduom, in a letter to the paper reacting to Mr
Kwamena Ahwoi, the former holder of the portfolio, said his reaction was to
clarify the issues he (Nduom) had raised for the avoidance of doubt.
“I am glad that Mr Ahwoi has found it necessary
to react to the story in the “Ghanaian Times’ of Friday, November 16, 2001 “Vision
2020 replaced”. Perhaps, the headline used for the story was not on target.
However, the content of the story was fairly consistent with what I presented
at the Greater Accra Regional Consultation Seminar last Thursday, November 15,
2001.
For the avoidance of doubt, and for the benefit
of your readers, I wish to clarify the points made at the seminar as follows.
The Ghana Vision 2020 is a long-term
development plan, which cannot be used as a basis for our current development
process for a number of reasons. The inability to meet most of the key targets
for its first 5 years of implementation, made it necessary for the present
government to understand why the targets were not met. It is our intention at
the very least to revise the long-term development plan. So to all intents and
purposes, the Ghana Vision 2020 is a dormant long-term development strategy
that is not in use.
The government of President Kufuor, intends to
prepare a long-term development plan. This plan will incorporate the vision of
the current government, the present economic realities, the anticipated efforts
of current policies and lessons learnt from the implementation of the First
Step of Vision 2020 (1996-2000).
When this long-term development plan is ready,
it will be presented to parliament as required by the Constitution. The Ghana
Poverty Reduction Strategy is a medium term development plan. The GPRS will be
incorporated into the long-term plan.”
Dr Nduom’s letter to the Times contained
further that a comparison of the Vision 2020 and its related documents with the
annual budgets (1996-2000) clearly shows a lack of harmony or linkages and that
it is also clear that the Ghana Vision 2020 did not have adequate financing.
“These are technical facts. Therefore, I am
disappointed that Mr Ahwoi chose to bring politics into his letter,” Dr Nduom
wrote.
More…/
The Trades Union Congress (TUC) does not
envisage any confrontation with government over demands for the restoration of
the End-of-Service Benefit (ESB) because it is prepared to negotiate and make
compromises on the issue, Mr Kwasi Adu Amankwah, the Secretary-General, has
said.
Speaking at Tamale on Wednesday in an interview,
he said the reaction of the union would, therefore, depend on the response of
government and other stakeholders to the gestures of the TUC. He said
currently, the TUC was negotiating with all the stakeholders and, as a
democratic organisation, it would not rush into any action without consulting
with its rank and file.
The TUC boss said that the decision to hoist
red flag over the restoration of the ESB was taken by the Accra and Tema
Councils of Labour and they had the mandate to do so under the organisational
structure of the union. It was therefore, wrong for anybody to impute that
workers were being misled by a group of people to confront Government, he said.
Mr Adu Amankwah said that agitation by labour
for the restoration of the ESB, which was frozen started four years ago but
fizzled out due to the “authoritarian might of the NDC”. Workers however
promised to continue the demand in future without considering under which
regime.
More…/
A final-year student of the University of Cape
Coast, Yaw Sefah Ampomah, has committed suicide because he felt he was “too
short.” He died in Kumasi hotel through poisoning.
Yaw, aged about 26, a level 400 student of
Geography and Tourism, felt that short and smallish men had no chance in the
world.
A message he left behind, stumbled upon by the
Times said: “Short people who have made it in life, started rising and climaxed
at a time when society was not aware of the prospects of people with height
advantage. But in this ultra-modern world, people are cautious of the
advantages of tallness.
“I know I possess all the will-power to resist
this suicide, but I felt it was needed. I saw it as a peaceful avenue to escape
social embarrassment.”
Yaw did not like the way he was brought up in
the society and said nature had been unfair to him. “I must confess that it
really pains me to see my younger siblings and some children, now taller and
fatter than me. All my body parts are small. Talk of my feet, toes, hands,
fingers, head, etc. As though that wasn’t enough I observed the hairs on my
little head were thinning, giving way for baldness to take over. Consequently,
I became fully convinced that the world has disappointed me, hence my decision
to take my life.
“If I continued to live to see what is
happening in the world, my heart would weep and I should be aggrieved. So, to
save myself from that, I decided to escape through death.”
In fact, I didn’t know I was short until 1998
when I entered the Training College. It worsened when I entered the University.
When I realised that all hope was lost after 20 years, I decided to be content
with myself.
Alas, society began to ‘pressurise’ me. After
three more years I felt left behind as I saw that children who I am about six
years older were growing to overtake me. I felt shorter and shorter. I felt
devalued.”
Yaw noted in his statement that his death could
not be understood by many people in the society and apologized to his father
for giving him such a shocker – “a painful blow whose pinch can be equated to
that of the arrow that pierced through the heart of the Virgin Mary.”
He said that although he wished to bury his
mother, events had compelled him to take the lead. “Let me quickly remark that
I might be spiritually blind to have seen that some external forces were acting
against me.”
Yaw’s death, according to the Times, has sent
shock waves through the student body. While some find the action absurd, others
are of the view that there were external forces behind his death. His parents,
from the Ashanti and Brong Ahafo Regions, are said to be devout Christians, but
Yaw was not.
The paper says its investigations revealed that
Yaw began to announce his intentions to his colleagues when he was in the first
year. But the students did not take his pronouncements serious, until the
unexpected happened. “I was destined to commit suicide,” Yaw wrote.
He has since been buried.
GRi…/
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
The Senior Staff Association (SSA) of the
Electoral Commission (EC), on Monday expressed concern about several issues at
the Commission and called for action to resolve them, the Ghana Palaver
reports.
An SSA source according to the story told the
Ghana News Agency that they were concerned about appointments, transfers and
conditions in their offices, among other things.
Citing the appointment of the Deputy Central
Regional Director as the Acting Western Regional Director as an example, the
SSA said: “The recent appointment of the Deputy Regional Director and other
Directors seems to have caused discontentment among the senior staff.” The
source said, “the SSA had observed with regret that some of those officers were
appointed over and above their senior counterparts.”
The SSA called on the commission to make the
underlying philosophy for the appointment open for senior staff to appreciate
the wisdom behind it to reduce the misconceptions and apprehensions.
The association questioned the rationale of
bringing an officer of the same rank and grade to head the region, which
suggested that either that Western Regional Deputy Director was not capable or
qualified for the for the post. “In such situation the commission should have
appointed an officer who is clearly a senior in ranking to the incumbent deputy
director in order not to undermine staff morale.
The association expressed concern about
transfers, which it said, were not systematically executed to reduce the
inconvenience and pressure associated with change of movement.
The SSA described conditions at most of the
district offices of the commission as deplorable adding that officers were
under constant threat of ejection. The association suggested that the EC, in
consultation with local unions and SSA, designs incentives packages to motivate
staff in such deprived areas.
GRi…/
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
The
Police Administration has stated that it will not be in the interest of the
service and the nation to grant study leave to over 100 policemen when it’s
manpower capacity is not adequate enough to deal with security threats.
It
said in the face of mounting criminal activities, particularly armed robberies
in several parts of the country, the service would not draw a balance between
it’s primary legislative functions and other secondary services like granting
of study leave and contribution of personnel for UN peace keeping
operations.
The
administration was reacting to complaints by some police officers on study leave
that they are being given raw deal. It noted that altogether there are 101
applicants for study leave this year but the administration granted approval
for 37 while 64 were disapproved.
GRi…/
Send
your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Assembly breaks 31st DWM grip and
removes 150 from payroll
The Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) has
finally moved to sever relationship with the 31st December Women's
Movement by removing from its payroll the salaries of 150 day care attendants
directly affiliated to the Movement but drawing their pay from the AMA for the
last 15 years.
According to The Ghanaian Chronicle story, the
situation is seen as a grievous burden on the Assembly's budget since it was
costing them around ¢30 million a month, but shrouded in secrecy because of the
circumstances surrounding how the affair developed.
From November this year, there will be no cash
for the attendants, however AMA still faces the additional challenge of finding
three months pay to give the 150 workers as severance benefits.
Legally, it appears the Assembly has been boxed
in because they were under marching orders to hire them. Just under a month
ago, the AMA formally found its voice and wrote to notify the DWM of its
decision to cease the payment of the salaries.
The Assembly were tasked to do a proper
headcount of the day care attendants in the city upon reports that ghost names
had crowded the payroll, a phenomenon which had become prevalent especially in
the in the Ministry of Education where the DWM had also penetrated and secured
some of their key officials to work for the Nana Konadu-led movement.
GRi…/
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Goosie calls foe probe of judges' murders
Goosie
Tanoh, 45, leader of the National Reform Party, has called for an independent,
apolitical commission to investigate the abduction and murder of three High
Court judges and a retired army major on June 30, 1982.
Mr Tanoh, according to the Weekend Statesman,
during an exclusive interview, however declined to go further into the
circumstances of the event, except to say that an independent, non-political
probe is needed to settle the controversy surrounding the murders. However, he
denied involvement in, or knowledge of, the deed.
Goosie, who last week announced he would soon
quit politics after almost twenty years in the trenches, is aware that history
will not forget his part in the affairs of the PNDC, particularly during the
large-scale abuse of human rights in the early years of the
"revolution." He has, in fact, attributed his parting of ways with
the NDC to his observation that it was "getting too dark under the
umbrella."
In the night of June 30, 1982, at the height of
the frenzy and intoxication brought on by the blood coup of December 31, 1981,
agents of the governing PNDC abducted the three judges and the retired army
officer from their homes. Operating in the darkness of a six-month old curfew,
they drove the four to the Bundase military range, shot them in cold blood and
attempted to erase the evidence by burning the bodies.
More…/
There are indications that the NPP is making
serious inroads into the Volta Region, the stronghold of the opposition NDC.
According to the Weekend Statesman, opinions sampled showed that should
elections be held today, the NPP would collect a substantial proportion of the
votes.
Thirty percent of the people interviewed this
week at Ho, the regional capital, gave the NPP thumps up, while 37 per cent at
Keta say they will vote for the party. 51 per cent and 52 per cent went to the NDC
in the two towns while 18 per cent and 10 per cent in the two towns said the
don’t know who they would vote for. The other parties registered a paltry 1 per
cent.
GRi…/
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Mensah Otabil talks to Agenda
It is too
early to judge whether or not the Government of President John Agyekum Kufuor
will change the status quo of governance in the country, says Dr Mensah Otabil
in The Weekend Agenda.
Dr
Otabil, General Overseer of the International Central Gospel Churches and a
critic of governance in Africa talked to the Agenda on an array of issues.
"Politically there has been a change; obviously there has been a new
President. There is a new party in power, there is change but it’s relative. We
have to give ourselves some time to judge if the change is radical and
beneficial," Dr. Otabil said of the performance of the Kufuor
administration.
He told Weekend Agenda that it would be good to
hear the first budget of the government to see their policy direction before he
could make a judgment.
He however, gave thumbs up for the Kufuor
government for some initiatives and indicated that he thinks the government is
genuine about its intentions to achieve a measurable improvement of life in the
Ghanaian people, but was ambivalent about the HIPC and Poverty Alleviation
Programmes.
He said, ex-President Rawlings should not be
measured in terms of President Kufuor, and was of the view that he (the former
President) has so far comported himself.
More…/
It is better to be in government with all the
troubles than in opposition, says the Minister for Information and Presidential
Affairs, Jake Obetsetbi-Lamptey. "Opposition was futile,"
Obetsebi-Lamptey told Weekend Agenda when he paid the paper a visit to get
accustomed with its operations.
Obetsebi-Lamptey
said when things were difficult he prods himself by recalling the not too
pleasant experiences in opposition. "When things get tough, I only look
back to our days in opposition. It was tough. You just talk without being
listened to. You cannot put your shoulders to the wheel," he told the
paper.
He said the NPP as a political party would be
in government for long because the party would pursue policies that would make
it possible for the people of Ghana to return them to power. "We are
drawing from our experiences in opposition and pursue policies that would
convince the people to vote for us again and again."
He conceded though that the government faced a
daunting task given the battering the economy had received over a long period.
He said the government was forced to revert the
Ministry of Media Relations back to the Ministry of Information because it did
not work.
GRi…/
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com