GRi Press Review 05 - 02 - 2003
Jake writes to Prof Mills
NDC’s ‘tribal’ politics condemned
Minimum wage talks deadlocked
Fuel racketeering syndicate smashed
Ministry concerned about DCE, MPs conflicts
NDC elects Njigu to contest Wulensi seat
Court convicts NPP
chairman for assault
AIDS-spreading Ghanaian busted in Finland
Ghana Telecom loses $1m a week
Jake writes to Prof Mills
In
an open letter to Prof Mills in an apparent reference to a leaflet titled,
“What the Fuel Price Increases will do to you” purportedly to have been issued
by the NDC, Obetsebi-Lamptey said for the NDC to say that the fuel price increases
were aimed at Ahantas, Fantes,
Gas and Ewes as part of an NPP plan to destroy the local fishing industry “is
totally unacceptable politics.”
“I
cannot believe you would want to govern a country in which tribes were at each
other’s throat as they are in other parts of our sub-region. Over and over
again, well meaning people call on the political parties not to stir up ethnic
hatred, yet here the NDC is at it again,” he said.
Full text of the letter is as follows
I
address this letter to you as Presidential Candidate of the National Democratic
Congress (NDC) and therefore ipso facto the leader and the one ultimately
responsible for all that is issued in the name of the
NDC.
A
leaflet titled, “What the Fuel Price Increases will do to you,” (copy attached)
issued by the National Democratic Congress has been brought to my notice.
The
government fully anticipated that its opponents would seize upon the issue of
the price increases to vilify it. We anticipated that there would be
distortions and disinformation in the attacks, this
would be business as usual for the NDC.
We
did hope that the issue would be contentious enough for the National Democratic
Congress to not need to resort to lies. Unfortunately, this was not to be. Your
claim in point 17 is a complete lie. The New Patriotic Party has not set up a
Transport Company for its supporters.
Even
with these two malicious lies I would not have bothered to write this open
letter. It is because of your point 14 that I must write. You seek the mandate
of the people, you wish to become President of Ghana.
- The
Evening News
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NDC’s ‘tribal’ politics condemned
Ferdinand
Ayim, Special Assistant to the Minister of
Information and Presidential Affairs, has described the document which seeks to
place the high increase in pre-mix fuel in a context of ethnic discrimination,
as “unfortunate and irresponsible, considering what is going on in a sister
country, Cote d’Ivoire.
Other
NPP politicians have reacted angrily to the report, which attempts to exploit
the fuel price increases to play the ‘ethnic’ card, saying that it is ‘shaming’
and calling for its condemnation, whiles the NDC seem unable to make a unified
statement on the subject.
Whiles
John Mahama, NDC Publicity Secretary, attempted to distance his party from the
leaked document in The Statesman on Tuesday, another NDC MP, Ama Benyiwa-Doe, in a heated
exchange with the Editor-in-Chief of the paper on Tuesday, defended the
document by saying that the Ahantas, Gas, Fantes and Ewes are the people who occupy the fishing
areas, as if the livelihood of every member of those ethnic groups depend on
the fishing industry.
The
member for Gomoa-West said the ethnic groups
occupying the coastal areas are suffering because of the fuel price
increases.
Also,
Fiifi Kwetey, a leading
member of the NDC and Features Editor at the Ghana Palaver stated on GTV
on Tuesday morning that the statement published in The Statesman, and
specifically paragraph 14, does, in effect, represent his party’s views.
Furthermore,
an article in Ghana Palaver the same day also confirmed, in not so many
words, the suggestions that “Meanwhile, Kufuor’s
buses are charging less, because the buses which are a gift from the Italian
government have been handed over to a group of NPP sympathisers to run.
Paragraph
17 of the leaked document reads: “The NPP has set up a Bus Transport Company
for a group of its supporters with buses provided free by the Italian
government. That company can afford to charge subsidised fares for this
reason…” The Palaver also wrote, “All the coastal fishing communities
are on the verge of collapse.”
NPP
government officials, however, are certain of their condemnation of the report.
Kwadwo Afari, the Press Secretary for the NPP said on
Tuesday, “The NDC, if this is an official NDC document, is wrong and should be
ashamed of introducing and promoting tribal politics. In this way, they are
forcing the nation to go backwards in its march towards democracy.
He
continued, “They obviously don’t understand the ideological conflict of the nation.
We need to transcend this type of politics in order to concentrate and focus on
organising the economic conditions of our country.”
Furthermore,
Dan Botwe, the General Secretary for the NPP, added:
“This is an unfortunate document and the NDC should distance themselves
from it. These are desperate and irresponsible politics and seasoned
politicians should know that they will not come back to power by trying to
create insecurity, and panic.” – The Statesman
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Minimum wage talks deadlocked
The
committee, after meeting for three hours, failed to arrive at a consensus
regarding the quantum of increment. Whiles the Trades Union Congress (TUC)
insisted on a 68 per cent increase to push the minimum wage from ¢7,200 to
¢12,000, the government and employers offered something less.
The
TUC believes that rejecting its proposal would be tantamount to downplaying the
impact of the recent fuel increase on the Ghanaian worker and therefore, is not
prepared to budge.
A
highly placed labour source on the committee told The Ghanaian Times
that the employers asked for “information on the impact assessment on industry”
before they could make an offer closer to what the TUC wanted. The source said
that the employers’ request indicated somehow that they were not adequately
prepared for the meeting adding that, they should have known that long before
the meeting.
It
could not say whether that was a tactical way of buying time. The source
pointed out that even though the Tema District Council of Labour had a point in
demanding a 100 per cent increment, the TUC still insisted on the 68 per cent
“since we know the economy is fragile and we do not want what happened to
Briefing
The Ghanaian Times after the meeting, Cecilia Bannerman, Minister of
Manpower Development and Employment, said a group comprising senior
representative, on the committee, had been constituted to further discuss the
issue with a view to untying the knots for a decision to be reached.
She
noted that the group was expected to submit a report to the Tripartite
Committee next week Thursday for deliberation.
As
things stand now, the minister could not specify when a new minimum wage could
be established. She explained that with such negotiations, one could not say
exactly when a compromise would be reached since unexpected issues could crop
up which would need more time for them to be appropriately dealt with.
Mrs
Bannerman was however, hopeful that the negotiations could be finalised as soon
as the group submitted its report. – The Ghanaian Times
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Fuel racketeering syndicate smashed
Tema
(Greater Accra) 05 February 2003 - Eight suspects including a security guard,
believed to be members of a fuel racketeering syndicate, have been arrested in
separate operations in Tema and Kumasi.
Six
of the racketeers who are suspected to have made a fortune out of their
subversive activities, were arrested at Tema whiles two were grabbed at
The
six arrested in Tema were identified as Steve Donkor,
28, Daniel Coleman, 32, Kwesi Ahroe,
29, Thomas Appiah, 29, Kofi Asamoah, 41, and Morgan Seidu,
37. they had in their possession, large quantities of
barrels and gallons of different sizes, rubber tubes and other materials used
in siphoning petroleum products.
Some
of the containers were filled with diesel, petrol and kerosene siphoned from
tankers that had taken delivery of the products from TOR for onward
distribution to accredited dealers.
Mrs
Agnes O. Sikanartey, the Tema Regional Police
Commander, who briefed The Ghanaian Times said that for some time the
police had been receiving reports about the activities of the syndicate around
the TOR area.
“In
the evening of Monday, we moved in while “business” was briskly going on but
most of them took to their heels on seeing us,” Mrs Sikanartey
stated. She disclosed that all the empty containers would be destroyed while
awaiting a decision from the courts on what to do with the seized
products.
The
two who were arrested in
The
syndicate operates at the Kumasi Depot of the BOST which holds the country’s
strategic reserves of petroleum products for the northern sector.
Nana
Nuako, a security guard who was allegedly caught
drawing petrol from a pipeline into a container last Sunday, is on the run
while two other guards, Dennis Aryeh and Stephen Obeng,
are said to have absented themselves from work since the syndicate was exposed
last Sunday.
Briefing
the Times on Tuesday, Benjamin Fairford Arthur, the
Depot Manager, said that BOST had for sometime now been recording abnormal
losses of about 2,000 litres of petroleum a day at the depot. “We have been
experiencing losses after discharges but all investigations aimed at finding
the cause yielded no dividend until last Sunday’s incident which we believe
could be the cause,” he stated.
According
to him, Osei and two other guards, Isaac Owusu Ansah
and K. Gyamfi of the Lions Security Company, a
private firm in
They
confronted Nuako who proved defiant but managed to
arrest him while Obeng and Aryeh looked on
unconcerned. With the assistance of security guards of Delta Security Company
on duty at a nearby sawmill, Nuako was supposedly
taken to the Asokwa Police Station but was later
found to have been released by Osei, enabling him to escape.
A few
hours after Nuako’s escape, a Nissan Sunny taxi
driven by Bazi, with a passenger, was found heading
towards a bush near the depot. Suspecting that the occupants might be up to
something fishy, Gyamfi and a colleague, Tugah, blocked the route on their return journey and
arrested Bazi upon finding two big drums and four
15-gallon capacity containers including the one which was being filled by Nuako in the car. – The Ghanaian Times
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Ministry concerned about DCE, MPs conflicts
This has been attributed to the poor working relations among district chief
executives, presiding members (PMs) and Members of
Parliament (MPs) in the running of the district assemblies as decentralised
institutions.
This was contained in a speech read on behalf of the Sector Minister, Kwadwo
Baah-Wiredu, at the opening of the southern sector maiden conference of
presiding members of metropolitan, municipal and district assemblies at Juapong in the North-Tongu
District in the Volta Region.
The two-day conference was on
the theme “Towards Greater Decentralisation” and embraced presiding members
from the Volta, Eastern, Greater Accra and Central regions, with the Deputy
Minister of MLGRD, Hajia Alima
Mahama, representing the sector minister.
Baah-Wiredu enjoined the PMs to devote their energies
towards the elimination of mistrust, intolerant behaviour and the tendency of
“showing people where power lies” in order to restore mutual respect to avoid
the undermining of peace and tranquility which is so
vital for development.
He said most assemblies are
found wanting when it comes to the generation of local revenue, although there
are enough resources in the districts from where such revenues could be generated,
adding that PMs should assist in formulating
strategies to outwit petty thievery on the part of revenue collectors and also
ensure good monitoring schemes.
According to the minister,
the allocation of the District Assemblies Common Fund to 36 district assemblies
was reduced last year owing to poor local revenue generation to merit higher
allocation.
He announced that there are proposals to elect four members for unit committees
with a population of 2,000 instead of 10, adding that more sub-metros will be
created for
Baah-Wiredu asked the PMs to work in concert with
District Security Committees to ensure peace in the districts and also urged
them to use communication as a tool to inform the world about achievements in
the districts, adding that “public office holders should not be afraid of
subjecting themselves to public scrutiny”.
In a goodwill message, the
National Association of Local Governments (NALAG) said it is good to share
ideas since it is the best practice to forge a way forward for effective
decentralisation and good governance.
The message, which was read by the Kadjebi DCE, Mr
Kofi Adjei Ntim, stressed that nothing should be done
to demean presiding members. He urged them to be conversant with the law
establishing district assemblies in order to know their roles well to avoid
conflict of interest.
In a good will message read on their behalf by the Volta Regional Police Commander Kofi Duku Arthur, the police called on PMs
to make use of their rich experiences and expertise in order to promote a
regime of peace, stability and harmony in the districts.
In another message, the MP for North-Tongu, Joe Gidisu, said the conference is a novelty and charged the PMs to live up to the challenges as frontliners
of political power in the districts.
The Paramount Chief of Dorfor Traditional Area, Togbega Ribitim Komlaga ll, who chaired the
function, said the district assembly concept has affirmed the participation of
ordinary people in governance. – Daily Graphic
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NDC elects Njigu to contest Wulensi seat
Wulensi (Northern Region)
Njigu, a professional teacher, polled 79 votes out of
the 182 valid votes cast to beat three other contestants. The keenly contested
primaries saw Laliri George Maaban
coming after Njigu with 62 votes. Danko
Monisa Okaja had 30 votes,
while Waja Joseph polled 12 votes.
The Electoral Commission (EC) supervised the elections at a special
constituency delegates congress of the party at Wulensi at the weekend. About 182 delegates, drawn from the
various branches of the party in the constituency, were in attendance. Some
regional and national executive members of the NDC were also present.
According to the Deputy General Secretary of the NDC, Bede
Ziedeng, the election was conducted in an atmosphere
of peace, for which he commended the delegates for the show of maturity.
He urged the rank and file of the party in the constituency to gird their loins
and work hard to ensure victory for the party in the forthcoming election
scheduled to take place on 20 February.
Ziedeng asked the party supporters not to “allow
themselves “to be deceived by the other parties, especially the ruling NPP,
which has failed to deliver on its campaign promises”.
The acting Northern Regional Chairman of the NDC, Alhaji Suleman
Garo, urged all party faithfuls to endeavour to put
the past behind them and come together to ensure victory, not only in the
by-election but also the 2004 general elections.
On his part, Njigu thanked the delegates for the
confidence reposed in him and pledged to work hard to retain the seat.
The Wulensi seat became vacant following the Supreme
Court’s majority decision to the effect that Samuel Nyimakan
is not qualified to stand as a candidate for election to Parliament in the Wulensi Constituency.
On
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Court convicts NPP
chairman for assault
Ho
(Volta Region) 05 February 2003 - The Chairman of the Ho Central Constituency
of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Van Seshi Torblu, was on Monday sentenced to a fine of ¢200,000 by a
Ho circuit court for assaulting Joefrey Mensah, an
electrician.
In
default, the accused will serve a three-month imprisonment in hard labour. The
accused pleaded guilty and was convicted on his own plea.
The court, presided over by E. Siameh ordered that
¢100,000 of the fine should be paid to the complainant.
On
29 December last year, the accused slapped Mensah when a misunderstanding
ensued between them at an end-of-year party at the residency.
Prosecuting,
Police Chief Inspector C. Agbodza, told the court
that on 29 December last year, there was an end-of-year get-together for
members of the NPP at the regional Minister’s residence. During the
merry-making, a misunderstanding ensued between the accused and the complainant
which resulted in the former slapping the latter.
A
complaint was later lodged at the Police station and the accused was arrested.
During preliminary interrogation, the accused admitted that offence, but
explained that the complainant was in the habit of insulting him. After
interrogation, he was put before court.
Passing
sentence, Siameh contended that verbal
insults was not a justification for intentional assault which could only
serve as a plea of mitigation of sentence. He said he was taking into
consideration the fat that the offence was committed in the heat of a quarrel
which the complainant played part.
In
his plea for mitigation of sentence, the accused pleaded for leniency and
promised not to repeat the offence again. He alleged that the complainant hit
him intentionally and when he complained, he (complainant) rather insulted him
and disgraced him before the gathering. – The Evening News
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AIDS-spreading Ghanaian busted in Finland
He
was also suspected to have infected some ladies with the virus around Osu and La, both suburbs of
He
had been in police custody since December last year after he was suspected to
have raped 12 ladies. Charges would also be laid against him for knowingly
infecting people with the HIV, probably around March this year in
According
to The Ghanaian Chronicle sources, a victim reported to the
George
Kings did not tell anyone about his HIV status and hid it even from his closest
friends and band mates. Kings’ band mates felt they had betrayed the Finish
women by looking on while George misbehaved. “We spend a lot of time together,
but he never said a word about his HIV status,” one of his mates said.
The
source continued that, Kings was extremely popular among Finnish women. His
charm seemed to work on women like a hot blade on butter. “There certainly was
no shortage,” the source added.
According
to one of the rape victims, Kings approach his victims, especially young women,
nicely and latter befriended them. He would then invite them to his residence
for a drink, which would finally weaken them to the extent that they would be
unable to move a muscle or make noise because he puts drugs into the drinks. It
is at this stage that Kings gets his victims. “George drugged and brutally
raped me,” the victim added.
Kings
has denied all the allegations saying that the women were lying. He admitted
having sex with them, but insists that it was protected and that he did not
make the women take drugs.
“I
have been very careful to always use protection,” Kings told the court at his
first trial where the court decided that the police should still kept him in
custody at Vantaa, which is at the outskirts of
Helsinki. He is likely to be convicted for about eight years in imprisonment
for the offences.
In
the country, the Chronicle inquiries at the Osu-La
areas have revealed that George had infected some ladies with the virus.
According to one lady, who spoke on anonymity, she had an affair with George
when he was in the country last two years and that she is going for an HIV test
to ascertain whether she has the virus or not. The last time he came to the
country, a Danish woman accompanied him, the paper gathered.
In
a related development, the Chief State Attorney, Eric Adbolosu,
said that there is no specific law to sentence people like Kings, who
intentionally infect other people with the virus. He noted that Article 14 (I)
(d) of the 1992 Constitution, which states that, “every person shall be
entitled to his personal liberty and no person shall be deprived of his
personal liberty except in the case of a person suffering from an infectious or
contagious disease, a person of unsound mind, a person addicted to drugs or
alcohol or a vagrant, for the purpose of his care or treatment or the
protection of the community,” could be used only to restrict people who have
the virus but not to prosecute and jail them. He called on the relevant
authorities to make the necessary changes to the law to cater for that. – The
Ghanaian Chronicle
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Ghana
Additionally,
the Minister of Communications is drawing the ire of the government and a
cash-strapped Minister of Finance is leaning on his colleague to reverse what
is suspected to be a fraudulent leakage in the GT system leading to a massive
decline in revenues for GT and the government of Ghana from a median figure of
$42m to consistent depreciation to $14m over the last four years.
The
paper’s follow-ups after the public spirited debate over the Telecom-Telenor saga appear to lead to known sources anxious to
halt an imminent plugging of loopholes that official Telecom sources show have
led to losses amounting to ¢560bn.
Conversation
with official and unofficial communications sources revealed that in 1998, the
International Telephone Traffic Revenue yielded $42.0m. the
following year, it dropped by $8.14m to $33.98m, followed by a further drop in
2000 by $7.63m to $26.4m in 2001. It then dropped by $5.16m to $21.20m in 2001.
This further reduced by $7.06m to $14.14m last year.
These
figures show losses incurred in respect of international telephones usually by
internet service providers who apply for huge numbers of phone lines to run
their business but, in actual fact, use them for these services and split the
revenue with the international arm of the agencies.
TINAFA, with huge antennas by the Ghana International Press Centre, was one of the companies busted in 2000 by the police with the cooperation of the National Communications Authority (NCA) officials.
This
shock shortfalls has alarmed the government, given the
fact that some 100,000 new lines have been installed since 1998 by GT. Sources
close to the Finance Minister confirmed that he sent a testy letter to the
Communications Minister, Felix Owusu Adjepong pushing
him to account for the steep decline and demanded a reversal in the decline.
The
losses shown by GT sources indicated revenue of $45m in 1998 as adds up to $64m
or the equivalent of ¢510bn of depleting revenues over the four-year period.
“The 45 per cent decline is alarming”, Osafo-Maafo charged in his letter to his
colleague.
The
Ghanaian Chronicle gathered that a lot of fraudulent activities are impacting negatively
on the revenue stream of GT with the strange acquiescence of the management.
One GT official that the paper spoke to even said they suspect that GT’s legal department may be in complicity over the lack of
aggressive pursuit of the fraudulent activities of many of the internet service
providers (ISP) most of which came into being over the period preceding the
2000 elections.
Within
GT, another source told the paper with a smirk on his face,
that their legal boss is widely nicknamed ‘No Show’ at the corporation
because of rampant non-appearance of GT lawyers in court cases that have led to
the collapse of cases involving GT.
Telecom
service providers who apply for huge quantities of telephone lines ostensibly
to operate their businesses use them to terminate international traffic in
voice which is offered to the GT network as local calls, thus denying GT
foreign exchange revenue. The suspected fraudulent activity-
the callback system- where international calls can be
made on the GT network but off telephone exchanges outside the country that are
located in the
The
Chronicle has learnt from authoritative sources that management of the new
company, Telenor, a Norwegian government/private
organisation which beat off six other Telecom vendors/operators to win the
management contract at GT are offloading equipment which would plug the
multi-million dollar losses accruing to the nation through these leakages in the
system.
That
should threaten the easy ‘cash-cow’ currently enjoyed by certain internet
service providers who see an imminent cut-off their gravy train. GT documents
sighted by the Chronicle dated September 2000 and signed by one of their
managers, B.O.K. Johnson, indicated a number of companies, namely TIN IFA, MAC
TELECOM, IDN as some of the companies or ISPs that are engaged in IVT and
details revenues from the traffic in telephone calls that terminate in Ghana,
and therefore constitute loss to Ghana and GT.
Independent
monitoring by the paper of the raging controversy over GT/Telenor
has shown the hand of one other operator who stands to lose most and is
currently engaged in a silent ‘battle’ with the paper, away from the eyes of
the Ghanaian public to get the NMC to stay the paper’s pen.
The
man in the shadow is Dr Nii Narku
Quaynor, a massive name-dropper who telegraphs his
meetings with Bill Gates and international figures like Kofi Annan complete
with photographs of him with Kofi Annan and other international figures.
Quaynor, incidentally, is the publisher of two papers, an industry paper
devoted to the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) sector, and the Network
Herald, edited by former Joy/Choice FM presenter, Mawuko
Zormelo.
It would
be recalled that it was Dr Quaynor’s paper, the Network
Herald which launched the offensive over the imminent cessation of dealing
with Telekom
The
Ghanaian Chronicle can authoritatively state that Quaynor stood
to lose personally because he is an owner of a company he packaged overnight,
G-COM, which together with Telekom Malaysia, own the
30 per cent share of GT.
It
would be recalled that The Ghanaian Chronicle was the first to cry wolf
over the telecom deals in Ghana with Telekom Malaysia
culminating in a collision with the Serious Fraud Office, (headed by Theophilus Cudjoe), the then
sector minister, Edward Salia, who is represented by
one lawyer Ofosu Dorte, and
the chairman of the NDC’s twin-Egle
Party and founding partner of Databank Financial Services, Danny Ofori-Atta.
The
paper stood its grounds and organised a press conference around 1998/99 to
rebut and expose the details of an SFO report produced by the then acting
Executive Director, Dominic Degraft Aidoo. The report questioned the alleged dubious role of
the then deputy Minister of Communications, Commander Griffiths, who was later
comprehensively exposed by the Chronicle.
Last
month, the National Media Commission received a response to complaints lodged
by Dr Nii Narku Quaynor against an article written by Nana Coomson, Chronicle’s absentee publisher last year. His
response contained damning legal papers and mention of Quaynor’s
dealings with G-COM together with a court judgement in which his continued use
of his offices behind the BNI headquarters. The building houses his Herald
Newspaper and NCS offices among many and the judgement went against him to his
discomfiture.
The
response letter authored by Coomson and dispatched by
Chronicle to the chairman of the NMC put the commission on notice that it is
his expectation that the complaint does not represent a stay of further
publications “because there are more material that pertain to more dealings of
Dr Quaynor which are of public interest and I intend
to put them out.” Dr Quaynor’s NCS is suspected to be
among companies that have as many as 550 telephone lines and stands as a
suspect in the voice-over- protocol abuse.
In
the event of the new management, Telenor has hinted
at blocking the lucrative international routing business access gateway. The callback system is NOT illegal in some countries but
The
head of GT’s Corporate Communications Department,
Johnny Tetteh-Addy, confirmed the story but was of
the opinion that the NCA was the best organisation to detect these activities
and should be held responsible for the fraudulent activities by these ISPs. He
noted that management has discussed the issue of purchasing a tele-fraud detecting equipment to detect illegal over voice
IP and callbacks. He said the equipment may cost
around $1.5m. – The Ghanaian Chronicle
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