MPs rent out duty houses…foreigners take occupancy
Move to fuse academic calendar…of junior and senior secondary schools
NDC plays ‘chaskele’ in the West
Dramatic AGC revelations
NDC’s move on sitting MPs…exposed!
New Ashanti Regional NPP body disintegrate…over Bantama constituency
MPs rent out duty houses…foreigners take occupancy
The Ghanaian Times reports in its top story that a number of Members of Parliament (MPs)have ‘commercialise’ their duty houses.
The Times says that while some of them have rented out their houses at very exorbitant rates, others have ‘temporary allocated’ theirs out for business and other commercial ventures.
For instance, the paper says that at the Manet Ville at East Airport in Accra, an Ivorian and two Ghanaians have taken occupancy of some of the estate houses allocated to the MPs as ‘Constituency Houses’.
The estate houses is said to have a property value of 75 million cedis each. The Times says that Parliament acquired the houses for its members but investigations have shown that the MPs have either rented or ‘given’ them out to businessmen, foreigners and other individuals.
The paper quotes unconfirmed reports as saying that the tenants have paid between six and seven million cedis for periods of two years or less. According to the story, some of the occupant said that the houses were transferred to them by the MPs because of their special ‘connections’. Others claimed that they were related to the MPs but they declined to name them, the story concludes.
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Move to fuse academic calendar…of junior and senior secondary schools
In a front-page banner headline story, the Daily Graphic reports that the Ghana Education Service (GES) has set up a seven-member committee to recommend strategies to synchronise the academic calendar of the junior and senior secondary schools. The committee is expected to submit its report to the GES by the end of March to enable it to duly inform the West African Examinations Council (WAEC) to allow the Council to prepare adequately for the examinations.
The Graphic says that the GES has, therefore, dispelled rumours that this year’s Basic Education Certificate Examination (BECE) and the Senior Secondary School Certificate Examination (SSSCE) would be held in March and June respectively, as part of efforts to harmonise the two academic years.
Mr Alex Tettey-Enyo, Director-General of the GES, who is reported to have disclosed this in an interview, said the change is envisaged to bring the academic year of the SSS in line with the old system. Under the old system, the academic year began in September and ended in June.
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NDC plays ‘chaskele’ in the West
The Guide, in its lead story, says that the battlefield is already rough for election 2000, but not just for the poorly resourced opposition parties. The paper says there is a serious fight of who-is-who in the Western Region by NDC activists as to who stands on which constituency on the ticket of the ruling party.
According to the Guide, in the Ellembelle constituency in Nzema, there is a serious dogfight between Colonel Kaku Korsah, Shama Ahanta East Metropolitan Chief Executive, who has blatantly disregarded the constitutional provision and embarked on partisan political campaign.
His opponent is said to be the Nzema East District Chief Executive, Mr J.R.D. Cobbina, and in whose constituency the serving army officer is pumping money to win the primaries, although his is still in the armed forces.
The papers says that reports from the Western Regional capital, Sekondi-Takoradi, indicate that the Regional Minister, Mrs Esther Lily Nkansah, is doing a balancing act to appease Mr Cobbina and to pave the way for the army officer, to contest the constituency seat.
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Dramatic AGC revelations
In a front-page splash, the Crusading Guide says that Monday February 14, 2000, will go down as a ‘red letter day’ for President Jerry Rawlings and his advisers.
The paper says it was the day the President and his men were taught a few basic lessons about the resilience of human nature and conviction; lessons they surely will be in a hurry to forget.
According to the Crusading Guide, the government in a desperate manoeuvre to construct a face-saving device with which to wriggle itself out f the jam in which it had boxed itself over the Ashanti Goldfields Company (AGC) saga, on that fateful Monday, despatched messages to former Mines and Energy Minister, Mr Fred Ohene-Kena and Mr Kofi Ansah, former chairman of the National Minerals Commission, asking them to formally announce their resignations from the AGC board of directors.
The story says that apparently, the government desperately needed those formal and public announcements of their resignation to give credence to the so-called ‘new deal’ purported to have been struck between the government, AGC, Lonmin Plc. And Adryx Mining &Metals Limited (Luxembourg), a minority shareholder, which was one of the applicants that initiated the recent court action in Accra.
The Crusading Guide says that unfortunately for the government, Mr Ohene-Kena and Mr Ansah were both not ready to help perpetrate a ‘gigantic fraud’ on the good people of Ghana and the international business community. Both men are said to have flatly refused to play ball, and rejected outright the idea of tendering in their resignations from the AGC, as requested by the government…
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NDC’s move on sitting MPs…exposed!
The Independent in its lead story, says that with the simmering anger from the President’s unilateral endorsement of Vice-President John Atta Mills still raging on, the NDC, last week, moved to stem the tide.
The paper says that with the broader framework of calming the nerves of all those discontented with the President’s decision, the party first resolved to deal with its ‘legislature brigade’ before the other organs, notably the cadres.
It says at an extraordinary meeting by the NDC hierarchy at the party’s headquarters in Accra last week, a unanimous verdict was reached that all sitting NDC MPs should be retained.
The Independent says that the meeting, which was chaired by Mrs Sherry Aryettey, a vice-chairperson of the party, resolved that for NDC cohesion and stability to retain power in the impending general elections, all the party’s 133 MPs should be maintained.
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New Ashanti Regional NPP body disintegrate…over Bantama constituency
The Ghana Palaver says that the newly-elected Ashanti Regional NPP executive body could disintegrate before it sets to work following sharp divisions within the committee as to how best to handle a very fluid situation, which has reared its ugly head in the Bantama constituency of the party.
According to the Palaver, investigations have revealed that a radical group within the Bantama constituency and the regional office, are agitating for the removal of Dr Winfred Anane the sitting Member of Parliament after his term of office as MP expires in the last quarter of this year.
The group is said to have accused the MP of betraying the party by dealing with the NDC to resolve his stand off with Nana Akwasi Agyeman, the Kumasi Metropolitan Chief Executive.
Dr Anane is also said to have been accused of being too gentle and dull in the discharge of urgent duties to his constituents and for centralising power and authority in a perceived cabal, who operates from a house at South Suntreso in Kumasi.
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