President leaves for G77 summit in Havana
Malaysian who spat in the face of Ghanaian
driver to be deported
Aboabo gears up to
eliminate expensive funerals
Lower Volta Basin feels neglected by VRA
Lotto receivers withdraw services
Ashanti Goldfields Bibiani pays eight billion
cedis to farmers
President leaves for G77 summit in Havana
Accra (Greater Accra) 12 April 2000
President Jerry John Rawlings left Accra on Tuesday for Havana, Cuba to attend the first summit of G77 and China, which opened on Monday and will last four days.
The first lady, Nana Konadu Agyeman Rawlings, Mr. Victor Gbeho, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr. Dan Abodakpi, Minister of Trade, Mr Daniel Ohene Agyekum, and Minister responsible for Protocol and Chieftaincy Affairs and officials of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, formed the president's entourage.
Mr. Joseph Laryea, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, told newsmen that the summit was first discussed in 1997, in San Jose, Costa Rica during Indonesia's Chairmanship of the group.
He said globalisation, North-South relations, South-South co-operation and science and technology would be discussed.
The Deputy Minister said the summit would adopt a plan of action for developing countries to be tabled before the forthcoming United Nations General Assembly. It would provide a platform for developing countries to articulate their vision and goals for development.
At the airport to see President Rawlings off were Vice President John Evans Atta Mills, Ministers, the Chief of Defence Staff, Lt General Ben Akafia, Mr. Peter Nanfuri, Inspector General of Police, the Cuban Ambassador, Mr. Jose Perrez Novoa and members of the diplomatic corps.
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Malaysian to be deported for spitting on
Ghanaian driver
Accra (Greater Accra) 12 April 2000
The Ghana Immigration Service has revoked the residence and work permits of Mr Latib Tokimin, Malaysian employee of Ghana Telecom (GT), for spitting onto the face of his Ghanaian driver, and given him 72 hours to leave the country.
A statement issued by the Director of Immigration, Mr. W.K. Aboah, in Accra on Tuesday, said the conduct of the Malaysian was found to be "reprehensible and an affront to the dignity of Ghana."
"The Ghana Immigration Service takes a serious view of the attitude of Mr. Tokimin and advises foreign employees and expatriates to treat their employees with due respect and dignity irrespective of colour or race."
Mr Tokimin, who was General Manager in charge of Marketing at the GT, last week was reported to have spat onto the face of his Ghanaian driver for reporting late to pick him for an engagement. The matter caused a lot of public indignation and tension between Malaysians and Ghanaians at GT were said to be high. Mr Tomkin was interdicted by the company and the GIS directive is the latest fall out from the issue.
GT is among a number high profile companies taken over by Malaysians when they were put on divestiture. The other is the Ghana-Malaysian Film Company, which also operates the TV 3 channel.
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Aboabo gears up
to eliminate expensive funerals
Aboabo Number Two (Brong Ahafo) 12
April 2000
The four Aboabo communities and
surrounding towns in the Dormaa District, have banned the making of special cloth
and 'T' shirts as a well as the
presentation of live sheep and other items to in-laws during funerals.
Barima Yeboah-Kodie, Aduanahene of
the Dormaa Traditional Area who announced this at a durbar at Aboabo Number Two
on Sunday said the measure is to reduce the cost of funerals in the area.
He said one of the causes of the
low standard of education in the area is the inability of parents to provide
the basic needs of their children.
"The only antidote is to
reduce the expenditure on funerals to enable parents and guardians to get money
and provide their wards with their basic needs and thereby enhance effective
teaching and learning in schools," he said.
Barima Yeboah-Kodie said any
family, which contravenes the by-law will pay a fine of 300,000 cedis with half
the amount going to the area council and the remaining for development.
He also revealed that a proposal
to combine funerals and prescribe the type of drinks to be served was being
considered.
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Lower Volta Basin feels neglected by VRA
Battor (Volta Region) 12 April 2000
The Riparian Society of Ghana, a non-governmental organisation (NGO) seeking the well-being of the people of the Lower Volta Basin has called on the Volta River Authority (VRA) to live up to its duty of assisting in the development of the area.
It noted that the construction of the Akosombo and Kpong dams has brought about socio-economic, environmental and cultural changes, which have adversely affected the lifestyles of the people and impoverished them.
Mr. Cornelius Kodjo Yakah, Executive Director of the Riparian Society said Act 46 of 1961 which established the VRA, enjoins the Authority to provide certain development needs of the area under its non-power functions but the VRA has neglected the Lower Volta Basin.
Mr. Yakah said during a seminar organised for students of the SOS Hermann Gmeiner International College (HGIC) at Mafi-Maklamador, near Battor that before the construction of the two dams, the main source of livelihood for the communities of the lower Volta Basin, was fishing, farming and picking of oysters.
However, with the construction of the dams, most of these tributaries got silted up. Rich alluvial soils deposited by annual floods for farming purposes ceased, a number of tributaries of the Volta River have disappeared and the reduced flow rate has increased the incidence of water borne diseases in the communities.
These developments, made fishing and farming no longer attractive and has degenerated into a situation of hopelessness resulting in poverty and illiteracy on a large scale, Mr Yakah said.
Children from the area have no scholarship schemes and the farthest most of them reach on the educational ladder is the junior secondary school (JSS) level, Mr Yakah said and charged the VRA for not building model schools or establishing scholarship schemes for the benefit of children in the area.
Mr. Reuben Coffie, a Marketing Specialist and a native of the area said as a result of poverty, people begun exploiting cultural practices such as the Trokosi system leading to human rights abuses and a lack of self-awareness on the need for the people improve upon their well-being.
He said blamed government for neglecting the needs of the area and cited a recent example where a grant of 30 million dollars from the Japanese government went to the Upper Volta Basin while most villages of the North and South Tongu districts where transportation and communication facilities are bad were left unattended.
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Lotto receivers withdraw services
Accra(Greater Accra) 12 April 2000
The National Lotto Receivers Union, a group that buys lotto coupons and tickets from the Department of National Lotteries (DNL), has withdrawn its services in protest against they being charged the Value Added Tax (VAT) while their competitors, the private lotto operators who print their own coupons, are exempted.
At a news conference in Accra, Mr. Dan Mensah, National Chairman of the Union, said the delay by the VAT Secretariat to get private lotto operators to pay VAT is pushing the DNL and the Union out of business.
He said while those who buy coupons and tickets from DNL pay 10 per cent VAT, private lotto operators do not pay anything. This gives them the advantage to give higher remuneration and commission to their employees and agents at the expense of DNL and the state.
Mr. Mensah described this as "strange" stressing, that "a significant amount of tax, running into billions of cedis is being evaded by the private lotto operators with impunity," adding that the mode of operation of the private lotteries smacks of tax evasion and fraud.
He said efforts to stop negative practices easily get stifled which goes to strengthen "our belief that some powerful elements are behind them and they are determined to maintain the status quo because they are benefiting from it."
Mr. Mensah also appealed to the government to increase the rate of commission paid to lotto receivers from 20 per cent to 30 per cent. According to him private lotto operators pay between 30 and 40 per cent as commission to their agents.
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Accra (Greater Accra) 12 April
2000
Vice President John Evans Atta
Mills on Tuesday paid tribute to former ambassador to Italy, Prof Eugene
Bortei-Doku who died in March this year, saying he would be greatly missed,
especially for his contributions to agriculture.
Professor Mills told a delegation
from the bereaved family, which called at the Castle to formally announce Prof Bortei-Doku's
death that, his passing away was a loss not only to the government but also to
the University of Ghana where he played a pioneering role in developing the
Faculty of Agriculture.
Prof Bortei-Doku served as the
Secretary of Agriculture under the erstwhile Provisional National Defence
Council. The eight-member delegation led by Wor-Nii Botelabi Borkete-Laweh XIV,
Chief of Nungua, included Dr J.L.S. Abbey, Executive Director of the Centre for
Policy Analysis.
According to the funeral
programme, burial will be at the Presbyterian cemetery on Saturday, 15 April,
while final rites will continue at his Nungua residence. The body will be laid
in state from Friday to Saturday.
"He was unassuming and modest
and certainly a source of inspiration to many colleague lecturers. He
distinguished himself where ever he went.
He is an example worthy of emulation by all," said Prof Mills, onetime
a senior lecturer at the University sadi of his departed colleague.
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Ashanti Goldfields Bibiani pays eight
billion cedis to farmers
Bibiani (Western Region) 12 April 2000
The Ashanti Goldfields Bibiani Limited (AGBL) has paid an amount of eight billion cedis to 900 local farmers as compensation for crop loss in its operational area in fulfilment of its commitment to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to help to
resettle farmers whose activities were adversely affected by its operations.
The compensation is also aimed at enhancing relationship between the company and communities in its concession area for whom it has already established two community farms at Bibiani and Anhwiaso, Mr Daniel Owiredu, Managing Director, said when Mr Cletus Avoka, Minister of Environment, Science and Technology visited the company on Monday.
Mr. Avoka who is on touring mining concerns in the Ashanti and Western regions to assess their compliance with the environmental regulations laid down by his Ministry.
Mr. Owiredu told the Minister that in line with its community support programme, the company has provided 13 boreholes and 14 hand-dug wells to 20 communities at 285 million cedis. It has also established 42 water-sampling sites within its concession to test and ensure the safety of potable water being supplied to the communities.
On land reclamation, Mr. Owiredu said a comprehensive programme has been put in place under which a nursery project was established and tree seedlings used to rejuvenate the vegetation in areas mined by the company.
Mr Owiredu said the AGBL, which started production in 1998, produces an average of between 23,000 and 24,000 ounces of gold per month, adding that the company has gold reserves which can be mined for a period of five years.
At Bonte Mines at Tetrem, Mr Douglas Mills, Operations Manager, said as at 1999, a total of 456 hectares of land had been mined on the Esaase and Jeni river leases in the concession area of the company.
Of this 80 per cent of the total impacted land has been re-filled while 40 per cent has been replanted and 25 per cent fully rehabilitated.
Mr. Mills said the company has instituted a number of measures to ensure that its operations are environmentally friendly adding that the company does not use any chemicals in its gold extraction process or tailings treatment. "We rely solely on a chemical free gravity recovery process".
He said the company continues to support the infrastructural development of the communities including, road rehabilitation, electricity supply, provision of boreholes and health care services.
In Mr Avoka commended the two mining companies for the practical programmes they had instituted in their concession areas to restore and rehabilitate all mined out areas within their various areas of operation.
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