Month: November 2017

Member of Parliament for Sege in the Ada West District, Christian Corletey Otuteye is calling for an investigation into the violence that characterized election of the District Chief Executive (DCE) of Ada in the Ada West Constituency despite heavy police presence.

“Assembly officials were beaten, we had the police there but they did not act to prevent the violence that was visited on people”.

He is calling for this investigation to be done by the police force outside Ada to ensure independence of the investigation.

According to the Sege legislator, the insecurity that characterized the 3rd November 2017 election of the DCE in Ada East was not known to people of Ada, hence condemnation from traditional leaders and opinion leaders.

“We witnessed another new form of invisible forces in Ada despite heavy police presence and people who portray themselves to be from National Security and a dent on our democracy”.

President Nana AkufoAddo had said he is not in favor of this hooliganism but for how long can we wait for this violence to come to an end, he lamented.

Again at this age of our democracy we had ballot box taken away tempered with and later brought back, “this is putting subsequent elections we are going to be having in the country in danger as we will have elections before the 2020 Presidential and parliamentary election”, he said.

Mr. Christian Corletey Otuteye had reported the incident to the leadership of the Minority in Parliament and according to checks done by ghanamps.com, leadership of the Minority will respond to the issue of violence by youth of the ruling government in the coming days.

By: Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/ghanamps.com

Minister of Education Mathew Opoku Prempeh has dismissed claims by Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, of government’s intention to relocate the satellite campus of the University of Environment and Sustainable Development from Donkorkrom to Bunso near Kyebi.

The former Deputy Minister of Education had alleged that the said relocation was without recourse to Parliament, although the house originally approved the construction of two campuses for the school at Donkorkrom and Somanya.

However, the Ministry of Education, in a statement, has denied these claims, saying “Ablakwa’s claim that an agreement had been reached to set up the university with Donkorkrom as one of its campuses and that government has reneged on it by relocating it to Bunso is completely false, preposterous and without merit.”

The statement further indicated that, the previous government rather reneged on this agreement by “bringing in a contractor from Brazil to do the work Exim Bank had been contracted to do.

Exim Bank protested strongly against the breach of faith and decided to abandon the project as it did not intend to share the site with the Brazilian contractor.”

By: Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/ghanamps.com

Former Deputy Education Minister in charge of Tertiary Education, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa has conceded he erred in suggesting that the supposed new location for the campus for the University of Environmental and Sustainable Development – Bunso- is at Kyebi.

The North Tongu legislator alleging the relocation move said: “The program which Parliament had already approved was that there will be two main campuses, the Somanya campus and the Donkorkrom campus in the Afram Plains area”.

“The information I have, which is unimpeachable, credible, is that this government has changed the second campus from Donkorkrom in Afram Plains to Bunso in Kyebi, and that is why they did not want to answer the question. The facility that this house approved in 2016 has to do with funding for two campuses, there is reasonable proximity.”

But after the Ministry of education debunked his claims   Mr. Ablakwa in an interview with ghanamps.com noted that his ‘Bunso in Kyebi’ claim was an error.
“It was a mistake on my part and you noticed that in my subsequent statement which I issued I corrected it. I said Bunso in the Abuakwa South Constituency. So that’s my error.

“The statement I wanted to make was that Bunso is in the Akyem area not Bunso in Kyebi. It was a clear mistake on my part and I apologize for that…”

By: Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/ghanamps.com

Minister of Interior, Ambrose Dery has been summoned to appear before Parliament to brief Members of Parliament over the circumstances leading to the death of two suspected arm robbers in Kumasi.

Mr. Dery is expected to be in the House on November 22, 2017, first Deputy Speaker Joseph Osei Owusu who presided over precedence on Friday 10th November 2017 gave this directives.

The Minority Chief Whip Mohammed-Mubarak Muntaka drew the attention of the first Deputy Speaker on the floor of the House, recounting that the suspects are from his constituency.

According to the Asawase legislator the police shot the two suspects when they accompanied them to help them identify location for some hidden weapons.

He further called for a thorough investigations since the circumstances leading to the death of the suspected arm robbers are not clear.

In addition he urged residents of Aboabo where the incident occurred not to take the law into their hands and cause chaos within the community but rather corporate with the police in their investigation.

By: Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/ghanamps.com

The Ranking member of Finance,Cassiel AtoForson has taken a swipe at government accusing it of blowing GHc 177 million cedis in the process that proceeded the issuance of the energy sector bond.

He noted in an interview on Thursday that government spent GHc 87 million on administrative expenses, as well as GHc 400, 000 on the printing of material for the energy bond roadshow.

His latest comment follows a press conference the Minority held on Wednesday where they alleged among others that the bond issue was a failure.

They also at the press conference accused the Akufo-Addo government of causing financial loss to the state, and requested that the Finance Minister, Ken Ofori-Atta be hauled before Parliament.
According to the Member of Parliament for Ajumako-Enyan-Essiam constituency, the expenditure amounts to reckless spending.

“From the cost that I have that the taxpayer is paying; the state is paying the arrangers, the banks, GHc87.5 million.

The state is paying legal fees of GHc700, 000; the state is paying the accountant, GHc350, 000. Surprisingly, the state is paying administrative expenses of GHc80 million. Overall the state is paying GHc177 million. I think this amount is way too much.”

Mr. Ato Forson pointed that the former administrations $1 billion Eurobond it issued the amount spent was lower than what the current administration is spending.

“This is not the first time the state is raising a bond. The last bond we raised under the Eurobond of $1 billion which translates to about GHc4.4 billion, the total cost was under 0.2 percent. Today, we are seeing a bond that we are raising for about 4 billion and the cost is about 1.77 percent.

He further said the Minister of Finance will be hauled before Parliament to give the actual breakdown of expenses for the energy bond since they suspect wrongdoing.

“I think it is important that we ask questions. So the question we are asking is that we want the Ministry of Finance to provide the state with further and better particulars.

We are asking for full breakdown of what constituted the administrative expenses. Printing of the road show material was GHc400, 000. We are going to haul the Minister before Parliament, to give us full breakdown to account for every cedi that has been spent so far. We think it is way too much and we smell something fishy,” he added.

By: Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/ghanamps.com

Member of Parliament for Bolgatanga Central, Isaac Adongo has taken a swipe at the Vice President Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia for consistently peddling falsehood about the state of Ghana’s economy.

According to Mr. Isaac Adongo  the recent failed attempts by the government to meet its target for the first tranche of the energy bond was an indication of the inability of the Economic management team, led by the Vice President, to manage the economy adequately.

He further noted that Dr. Bawumia has been “over-hyped and his eloquence” had convinced Ghanaians to accept his “lies” about the state of the economy.

“Bawumia has never understood the economy of Ghana. He has always lied about the economy of Ghana.

He said that our debt was about 36 billion and would end at 40 billion dollars. When he came with his budget, he said it was around 26 billion.

How did John Mahama miraculously find 14 billion dollars to pay down the debt in three months before we left office? He took the people of Ghana for a ride,” he said.
“The reality is that, he knows nothing but he’s so confident and eloquent that he can confuse all of you.

The reality is that he’s now managing the economy and must walk the talk. But with this bond, I doubt they will attempt the four billion again because they will not get a third rematch because the investors are already away from it.”

The managers of the bond sought to raise 6 billion cedis under two separate bonds, but accrued a total of 4.6 billion cedis after it closed the auction.
According to Isaac Adongo, despite being able to raise a $2.25 billion bond in hours in April on the back of the goodwill built up by the previous administration, the subsequent attempts have failed because of waning investor confidence.

“They rode on the back of the confidence of the economy that the NDC left, to raise a bond of $2.25 billion in four hours. What has now happened that in one month, they still can’t raise it? They are destroying the fundamentals that we developed for them.

When they were in their honeymoon period and were taking credit we told them to wait and that their time would come. Their time has come and we have been embarrassed,” he said.

By: Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/ghanamps.com

Member of Parliament for Yilo Krobo, Kofi Magnus Amoatey has dismissed assertion that the Minority has expressed fear that when the Office of the Special Prosecutor Bill 2017 goes through, it will be used against appointees of the previous government.
Is the law not being made to stamp out corruption, which affect all Ghanaians, “lets no body be mistaken that we on the Minority side are against passage of this Bill”.

“Looted government money will affect every Ghanaian, schools cannot be built in my community”

According to the Yilo Krobo legislator whatever will be agreed on in the law will be applicable to the Majority or appointees of the ruling government while in office.

Again the Bill will be there in perpetuity, even Ghanaians abroad will be affected, those in the diaspora even come to accept juicy positions because they are out there they do all kinds of political activities unknown to you and me, But only known to our political leaders and they are appointed

He further pointed out that working on the Bill both sides of the House have come to accept that there is nothing like independent Special Prosecutor, but what we can have is impartial prosecutor.

“Even the President Nana Akufo-Addo is not independent he belongs to a political persuasion and whoever will be appointing the Special Prosecutor will have at the back of his mind his or her interest”.

And further indicated that he is against the move to set a search committee to get the SP, “it is obvious the Judiciary will have an interest public service will say we want that person”.

This is a job that can be done between the Attorney General and the Public Service Commission, otherwise it will be open up for political consideration, he said.

He further indicated that with the current scrutiny of the Special Prosecutor Bill, it will pass the test of time.

By: Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/ghanamps.com

Member of Parliament for Aowin Mathias Kwame Ntow has served the strangers indication that he will bring to the attention of the Speaker of Parliament Professor Aaron Oquaye blocking of the West wing gate of Parliament on Tuesday 7th of November 2017 without prior notice to MPs.

Some MPs were unhappy when they were reporting to the House on Tuesday morning only to realize that the road has been blocked and they were re-directed to go through the Accra International conference of the gate.

Mr. Ntow raised the issue on the floor of the House when the first Deputy Speaker Joseph Osei Owusu was presiding and said the premises does not belong to Parliament, it belongs to state protocol and they had, had some arrangement for the premises to be used.

He further noted that out of respect he has for the first Deputy Speaker, he did not react immediately on the floor but he disagree with the first Deputy Speaker and will take the mater up with the Speaker who is currently out of the country.

“I decided to enquire what was leading to block of the road preventing MPS from using the West wing gate to enter the House, I was told some British were having their movie, they come all the way from their Country to dictate to us?”

In case of any eventuality, what it means is that we are going to be trapped, in the same vain “we could have strangers enter the premises to kidnap or kill us”, he lamented.

According to the Aowin legislator when MPs gather in Parliament it is the whole of Ghana that has gathered, so we cannot sit down unconcern for people to come and raid out land no, it is not acceptable,no we will not agree to that he said.

.By: Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/ghanamps.com