GRi BEF News Ghana 04 - 10 - 2001
Don't do direct credit delivery - Government advised
Volta River Authority to part pay $30m of debt to Cote d'Ivoire
Government initiates strategy to adjust salaries
New Microsoft product in Ghana
Second Car Rentals awards launched
Accra (Greater Accra) 04 October 2001-The Ghana Micro Finance Network (GHAMFIN) on Wednesday advised the government against direct involvement in credit delivery but should rather encourage institutions with the professional capacity to provide such services.
In a communiqué issued in Accra GHAMFIN said this is against the background of government divesting itself of direct involvement in business activities, its history of low loan recovery rates and misapplication of funds targeted at the poor.
Government should rather be a catalyst by providing an enabling environment for micro-finance industry to thrive.
''The government should specifically address policy issues such as macro-economic indicators and regulatory framework, fiscal issues such as tax relief and tax holidays'', it said.
The communiqué said the government should also facilitate the sourcing of funding for that sector and ensure capacity building at all levels to enhance the growth of the sector.
GHAMFIN also spoke against interest rate subsidisation, saying: "If economic development is the focus and not social or welfare interventions then subsidisation does not foster such development.
''Specifically it does not enable micro finance institutions to be sustainable and to expand to serve others. Interest rate subsidisation results in market distortions, encourages indiscriminate disbursement with the risk of diversion to non-target group".
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Accra (Greater Accra) 04 October 2001-The Volta River Authority (VRA) on Wednesday said it has made a firm commitment to settle 30 million dollars representing 60 per cent of its 50 million dollars indebtedness to the Electricity Company of La Cote d'Ivoire by the end of December this year.
VRA has already taken the necessary steps to transfer five million dollars to the Ivorian power utility and another 10 million dollars would be disbursed within four weeks after clearance of the first instalment.
Dr Charles Wereko-Brobby, Chief Executive of VRA in a statement issued in Accra said the commitment means VRA's precarious financial situation would be further worsened and its ability to provide reliable and sustainable electrical power may also suffer.
A three-member Ivorian delegation, has since Monday been negotiating with the executive of the VRA to seek firm pledges on the settlement of the its indebtedness for power purchased over the last few years.
The statement said the two parties also agreed on the establishment of an Escrow Account for VRA to make monthly fixed payment into it.
It said the payment would mean that VRA would not be able to address the problem of the low level of the Volta Lake and other priority maintenance scheduled to ensure quality supply of electricity.
This, the statement said would however, be possible if tariffs are enhanced considerably to make funds available for the procurement of crude oil to run the thermal plant at Takoradi next year.
The two parties also discussed the extension of power supply to the country for 2002 and beyond. A decision on the volume of power to be imported would be agreed on later and would depend on VRA's ability to pay promptly for such imports, it said.
Dr Wereko-Brobby led the VRA's team while Mr Alain Ekolan, Deputy Chief Executive (Operations) of Ivorian Power Utility led his side.
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Accra (Greater Accra) 04 October 2001-The National Overview Committee (NOC), which oversees the implementation of the Public Sector Reform Programme, has initiated a comprehensive survey and strategy to move Public Sector Salaries closer to those in the private sector.
The outcome of the study, which seeks to motivate and enhance public sector workers' performance, would be made known to the public once the exercise was completed.
Mr Jake Obetsebi-Lamptey, Minister of Presidential Affairs and Chief of Staff, announced this at a two-day national planning workshop for Phase II of the Public Sector Management Reform Programme (PSMRP) in Accra on Wednesday.
Initiated in December 1994, the Reform Programme is to define a new vision and role for the public service as a means of promoting efficiency, effectiveness, good customer relationship and accountability.
It involves downsizing staff levels and transferring the affected workers to alternative employment areas where they would be relevant.
Mr Obetsebi-Lamptey said the government's success in its drive for a strong private sector led economy could only be attained on the back of an empowered and well-motivated public sector.
"There is the need to change the public sector worker's attitude from a reactionary to a positive contributor to national development goals," he said and added that the government would do anything it could to train and enhance the capacity of public sector workers.
Mr Obetsebi-Lamptey underlined the government's commitment to continue with the Reform programmes, which he said, was in line with its own development goals and aspirations of achieving accelerated growth with equity and to promote good governance.
"I am glad to inform you that the NOC is satisfied with progress made so far by the reform programme in the last eight months."
The government, he said, has the opportunity to build into the next phase of the programme initiatives that would support the realisation of its vision for the Public Sector.
These initiatives were good governance, capacity development and utilisation for sound policy formulation, implementation, monitoring and evaluation and improved service delivery.
"This opportunity, I promise, we shall utilise to the best of our ability in the interest of the nation and we will not allow it to slip by."
Mr Obetsebi-Lamptey mentioned the modernisation of the Office of the President, the restructuring of the Ministry of Women Affairs and the creation of a one-stop agency for land administration to save individual and corporate investors time as priority areas that the government would want included in the reform.
The Minister called for continuous co-operation and support of the country's development partners of reforming the Civil Service and government machinery at both the central and local government levels.
Mr Obetsebi Lamptey conveyed Vice President Alhaji Aliu Mahama's desire to the participants to approve new initiatives only after outstanding projects had been executed or at least arrangements made to complete them.
Vice-President Mahama is NOC's chairman.
Some of the projects NOC would like to be completed under the Phase II included the University of Ghana, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Ghana News Agency and Ghana Broadcasting Corporation.
Mr Obetsebi-Lamptey drew the World Bank's attention to some difficulties in its procurement procedures and inadequate information sharing on projects.
He sad this had made it impossible to optimise the use of UNDP and World Bank funds in some agencies, thus stalling the implementation of the Alternative Employment Programme.
The Minister lauded the cautious way the programme had been implemented without interfering with the independence of constitutional bodies such as the National Commission for Civic Education, Electoral Commission, Judiciary and some civil society organisations.
Mr Obetsebi-Lamptey asked the participants to work out alternative strategies to avoid the present difficulties and delays in the future programme.
Dr Appiah Koranteng, National Co-ordinator, National Institutional Renewal Programme, said the need to restructure the public sector was at the core of the country's development.
He said the visions set out in the project were being achieved and there was the need to improve the system.
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Accra (Greater Accra) 04 October 2001-A new computer software, Microsoft XP, an improvement of Microsoft '97 and '2000, was on Wednesday introduced on the Ghanaian market.
Microsoft Corporation of the United States released the product, accessible on a compact disk, to the market on May 31.
At a press conference in Accra to launch the new product, Mrs Patricia Konan, Enterprise Group Manager for Microsoft, West Africa, said the main feature of the new software is its ability to prevent piracy.
She said about 90 per cent of software produced are pirated by the end-users and called on the media to help fight piracy.
"Piracy of software has made a lot of governments lose revenue, producers do not earn enough from their investment and the rate of piracy does not help to create employment in most countries."
Mrs Konan said the new software is able to translate a document from one language into another and it is available in more that 30 languages.
It also has the potential to enhance efficiency in offices, she said, adding: "It is of benefit to everyone in the workplace and provides unique personal, collaborative and organisational experiences."
One is able to open several e-mail accounts at the same time and has a voice-backed Excel programme, she said.
Mrs Konan said another special feature of the new product is its 'smart tag' that enables linkage of the user input in office applications to other business applications.
"This enables a user to have much easier access to data," she said.
She said rather than moving between multiple applications- and starting from the beginning in each application- smart tags help add context by passing data from office to other applications, based on what the user is reading, reviewing or typing.
Mrs Konan said this technology puts power and convenience at the hands of users by reacting to their needs as they work. In addition developers can create custom smart tags for organisations to automatically link business application.
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Accra (Greater Accra) 04 October 2001-The Ghana Stock Exchange All Share Index dropped 1.8 points on Wednesday to finish at 957.46 points as bearish sentiments again dominate activities on the market.
The Index, which closed 3.22 points stronger at the previous close, saw its lead cancelled as Ghana Commercial Bank lost 50 cedis to push it down despite huge gains by British American Tobacco (BAT), Enterprise Insurance Company (EIC) and UNIL.
Market activities were dull as institutional investors continued to shun the bourse.
Total volume traded, however, leapt from a low of 36,000 to a high of 63,900 shares on Wednesday.
In all nine equities sold shares. EIC sold 21,800 shares to lead the pack with Ghana Brewery Limited and Ghana Commercial Bank, selling 14,800 and 11,700 shares respectively.
There were four price changes - three positive and one negative. EIC gained 50 cedis for the second successive trading session to close at 3,000 cedis, UNIL also made another 50 cedis at 2,200 cedis and BAT went up 20 cedis to close 620 cedis. GCB was the only loser for the session. It lost 50 cedis at 1,500 cedis.
Market capitalisation fell marginally to close at 3,906.97 billion cedis compared to 3,910.46 billion cedis at the previous close on Monday.
Below are the closing prices of the listed equities in cedis:
ABL 320
AGC 18,800
ALW 4,300
BAT 620 +20
CFAO 60
EIC 3,000 +50
FML 1,000
GBL 1,300
GCB 1,500 -50
GGL 900
HFC 952
MGL 240
MLC 142
MOGL 20,000
PAF 800
PBC 450
PZ 1,000
SCB 20,500
SPPC 297
SSB 2,300
UNIL 2,200 +50
CMLT 430
GNA
DK/AL
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Accra (Greater Accra) 04 October 2001-This year’s awards of the Car Rentals Association of Ghana (CRAG) will be held in Accra in December, Mr Foster Joe Nyarko, CRAG President, announced on Tuesday.
Launching the annual programme in Accra, Mr Nyarko said the awards include: the Most Promising Car Rental Operator, Best Transport Officer and Best Driver.
He expressed concern about the number of freelance car rental operators in the country and said these operators are not guided or controlled by anybody and aggrieved customers have no means of seeking redress.
Mr Nyarko said the association has received a number of complaints from people who were short-changed in one way or the other after using the services of these operators, but in most cases, they were unable to contact them.
He called on the Ghana Civil Aviation Authority to allow only registered members of the association to operate car rental services at the Airport.
Mr Nyarko appealed to the government to give the association tax relief to enable it acquire more vehicles and offer better services to customers.
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