"I acted in good faith in the Quality Grain Project" - Peprah
Accra (Greater Accra) 01 February 2002 - Ex-President, Flight Lieutenant Jerry John Rawlings said on Thursday that he would not like to prejudice the peoples' mind about President John Agyekum Kufuor's State of the Nation Address delivered to
Parliament.
He said it was for the masses to read between the lines and make their own judgement since "as at now they have become aware of the propaganda being peddled around by the government, so let us hear what they feel about the address".
Flt. Lt. Rawlings said at the Parliament House, where he had gone with his wife Nana Konadu Agyemang to listen to the address, that President Kufuor had made his speech and he would not want to make any comment until Members of Parliament had debated on it and made their input.
Dr Edward Mahama, Leader of the Peoples' National Convention (PNC) said the presence of the various political leaders, especially Flt. Lt. Rawlings gave hope for the development of democracy and nationalism and that it was not an occasion for the New Patriotic Party (NPP) to rejoice about.
Dr Mahama said he would like to study the address before making any comments and that it was too early to pass judgement on a number of national issues without any background information.
Mr Dan Lartey, Leader of the Great Consolidated Peoples' Party (GCPP) described the address as empty and without any structure for development in the country. He said President Kufuor was just elaborating on loans contracted, which could not be used for development projects.
Mr Lartey expressed disappointment over the gradual phasing out of the "Cash and Carry" system in the address, adding, "we supported a positive change and not progressive change which seems to be the case now."
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Accra (Greater Accra) 01 February 2002 - The Minority Leader Alban Bagbin on Thursday described President John Agyekum Kufuor's Sessional Address to Parliament as "uninspiring, without focus and lacking priority."
He said the address was rather disappointing, " because it is business as usual, outlining projects and programmes that were initiated and approved by the former National Democratic Congress (NDC) government.
"This goes to vindicate us that we, as a government were doing the right things, so far as the development of the country was concerned'', Mr Bagbin said in an interview with the Ghana news Agency.
He said the Minority thought after one year in office, President Kufuor was going to come out with new plans and projects that his government was going to implement leading to a significant socio-economic change.
"He should not be telling us what we had already initiated and approved as a Parliament." The Minority Leader said "the Accra-Aflao and Accra- Yamouransa roads for instance, were approved by the last Parliament and is nothing new to us."
When asked if he saw nothing new and positive in President Kufuor's address, he said: " We do not see anything new in the whole address. If there is anything new, somebody should call my attention to it."
Mr Bagbin said the speech was not reconciliatory as it failed to recognise the presence of former President Jerry John Rawlings and his wife Nana Konadu Agyemang in the chamber.
"The address did not even recognise the presence of the Vice-President, Chief Justice and other notable persons, who were present. This is not reconciliatory enough and would not help the reconciliation process that we are trying to build."
The question of recognising dignitaries, who attended Parliament, came up for debate in Parliament recently and the Speaker Mr Peter Ala Adjetey ruled that such persons should not to be recognised since they were visitors to the House.
Mr Bagbin made reference to the State of the Union Address of the United States, where President George Bush showed respect and recognition to all the former leaders and notables present.
"The opening part of the speech did nothing but attack the previous regime, giving the impression that the previous regime did nothing worthy of credit." He said President Kufuor's prioritisation that put infrastructure ahead of good governance "shows that he has misplaced priorities."
Mr Joe Badoe Ansah, Vice-Chairman of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Communication, Mr Joe Badoe Ansah's observation contrasted sharply that of Mr Bagbin, describing the address as "positive capturing the vision of the President, what had happened last year and how we intend to change things."
"The address takes a multi-sector approach to things and no doubt reflects the overall determination to development."
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Accra (Greater Accra) 01 February 2002 - President John Agyekum Kufuor on Thursday defended his government's decision to opt for the Highly Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative as the necessary response to the reality on the ground at the time.
"Our debts were suffocating us. They are mostly unproductive debts and we were spending more than half our revenue to simply pay the interest on them, leaving us with very little for urgently needed development," he said.
Delivering his Second State of the Nationa Address to Parliament he told the packed House that it was not difficult to come to the conclusion that Ghana was a highly indebted poor country because, "on the books and in reality, it was. Nobody can dispute that."
He said the country would within the next few weeks reach the decision point to facilitate the debt relief being sought. "Simply put, it means our creditors having been convinced that Ghana truly deserves a respite, would tell us on that date, how much relief they would grant us on our indebtedness.
"The indications from the G8 member countries, the world richest nations, who are our main creditors, are that we can expect a total write-off from most of them," he said.
President Kufuor said because Ghana opted for the initiative, its creditors suspended transfers of about 200 million dollars, which would have gone into paying interest on debts for last year.
The main conditionality that HIPC demanded was that the money accruing from the relief should be transparently channelled into poverty reduction strategy. "We cannot and we were not hoping to base our economic recovery programme on HIPC, nor, indeed, on Ghana Poverty Reduction Strategy (GPRS) alone..... (HIPC) is only meant to give us some breathing space while we reorganise our affairs properly," he said.
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Accra (Greater Accra) 01 February 2002 - Major Courage Quashigah (rtd), Minister of Food and Agriculture on Thursday said that the government wanted agriculture to be business driven and thereby make it more lucrative for private sector investors.
The investment would be more on brokerage and thus moving it from its current subsistence level to a more scientific approach, the Minister said in an interview to react to the assertion by some National Democratic Congress (NDC) Members of
Parliament that the government's policy on modernising agriculture as contained in President John Agyekum Kufuor's State of the Nation Address to Parliament was vague.
Maj. Quashigah said: "Modernisation of agriculture goes beyond mechanisation, irrigation and credit facilities to farmers. It involves looking for ready market for agricultural produce, extending farm roads and tracks to producing centres so that food could be easily and quickly transported from the farm gate to the market centre.
"There is the need for agriculture produce to be processed on farms taking into account packaging, storage and transportation and for the farmer to earn more from his sweat than it is currently the case when the farmer is left poor and incarcerated where he has no motivation to continue to produce.
"What is happening at the subsistence level is that there is a great loss through unscientific harvest, loss of revenue to farmers due to poor marketing and poor preservation".
Maj Quashigah said the ministry would soon come out with a strategic plan document on modernising agriculture and how to sensitise the farmers on what to do exactly so that their investment would not always be a loss. He said it was necessary for the nation to attain food security and it could be done through scientific means with the involvement of existing research institutions.
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These are Cabinet approval for the take-off of the West Africa Gas Pipeline Project and review of the Bui Dam Project proposals to expand it for multi purpose uses.
President Kufuor, who outlined this programme in his second session address to Parliament in Accra, said the Efaso Thermal Barge built three years ago and left in Italian Waters would be brought to Ghana by the end of March to augment energy output.
The Government was also in contact with CMS Company of Michigan, USA, to raise the necessary resources to complete the second phase of the Aboadze Thermal Plant, which was expected to reduce its production cost by one-third.
President Kufour said these interventions would diversify and increase the nation's electricity generation. "The search for oil and gas will continue, with shifting attention to deep sea areas of our exclusive economic zone," he said.
President Kufuor said the government was encouraging the increasing use of solar power whilst rural electrification project was continuing.
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Accra (Greater Accra) 01 February 2002 - President John Agyekum Kufuor on Thursday decried the state of education in the country and looked at it with "a general sense of dissatisfaction".
He said, it was to address this situation that a 28-member Education Reforms Review Committee had been appointed and was expected to submit its report within the next four months.
President Kufuor said this in his Second State of the Nation Address to Parliament in Accra. The government had tasked the committee to examine the feasibility of improving the educational system to ensure that there was uninterrupted education for all Ghanaians from pre-school until they attained the age of 16 or 17.
"This will ensure equality of opportunity, especially, for children from illiterate homes," President Kufuor said. President Kufuor referred to the high school dropout rate between junior secondary school (JSS) and senior secondary School (SSS) levels and said more than 200,000 children dropout of school at this level every year when they were at their most vulnerable age.
"The consequences are an increase in many social problems; like teenage pregnancy, child labour and the phenomenon of street children," he said. President Kufuor said the other problem was the alarming and ever increasing gap that existed between the standard of education in the rural and urban areas.
He cited an instance of a 14-year-old boy brought from the Krobo area to live in Accra two weeks ago. "The boy had come from primary six in the village and after a full morning of testing, the teachers decided the boy could not be admitted to class six and that his real standard was in primary three."
President Kufuor said many of the teachers in the rural areas were untrained; too many of them were dispirited because of the ill-equipped and poor conditions of the schools there.
He said these made them feel that teaching in the rural areas was meant to be punishment for them and the end of their ambitions and pledged that government had set about trying to remedy the sad state of affairs.
President Kufuor said incentives such as radio cassette players, cooking utensils, bicycles and motorbikes were being made available for teachers in the rural areas and the government would continue the construction of houses for teachers in the rural areas.
He said perhaps the most critical factor in the educational system was the teacher training institutions and they were being equipped to help the training and re-training of adequate numbers of teachers to enable them to keep pace with the modern world and satisfy an acceptable teacher-pupil ratio.
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Accra (Greater Accra) 01 February 2002 - President John Agyekum Kufuor on Thursday lauded his numerous foreign trips that had attracted criticisms from a section of the public as a good pursuit that had established good relations between the country and the international community.
President Kufuor, who was delivering his Second State of the Nation Address to Parliament, said his one-year administration had been able to improve relations with the country's neighbours to ensure that Ghana enjoyed peace and stability.
"I am happy to be able to tell you that Ghana is at peace with all her neighbours. The mutual suspicion that used to characterise the relations with some of our immediate neighbours has been dramatically abated," he said, smiling broadly to acknowledge cheers from the packed house.
President Kufuor said the past year also saw relations between Ghana and the rich industrial nations reaching new heights of friendship and co-operation. "I received invitations from practically each and everyone of the leaders of these nations and was able to visit only just a number."
He said Ghana had benefited from good relations and enthusiastic support for the past year from the United Nations and its agencies, the Bretton Woods Institutions and other multilateral agencies. He commended them for their support when the country opted for the Highly Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative.
President Kufuor said Ghana had assumed her historic role as a major player on the African continent and congratulated Dr Mohammed Ibn Chambas, Member of Parliament for Bimbilla on his election as Executive Secretary of The Economic Community for West Africa States (ECOWAS).
He also congratulated Mr Kofi Annan on his re-election for a second-term as United Nations Secretary General and for winning last year's Nobel Peace Prize. President Kufuor condemned the September 11 terrorist attack on United States that killed more than 3,000 people including Ghanaians and promised that Ghana would assist in efforts at ridding the world of terrorism.
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Accra (Greater Accra) 01 February 2002 - Some Minority Members of Parliament on Thursday said President John Agyekum Kufuor's second message on the state of the nation was hostile to the National Democratic Congress (NDC) and did not sound reconciliatory enough.
They were reacting to the address in an interview with the Ghana News Agency saying: "Now that the nation is geared towards reconciliation the President's address should be historically and economically balanced and to praise where praise is due. It sounded as if for 20 years the nation achieved nothing."
Mr Kosi Kedem, NDC - Hohoe South said, "the opening section of the address was full of attack on the NDC government. It wasn't reconciliatory. The President created the impression that the NDC did nothing good during its rule". Mr Kedem said it was surprising that the NPP had now found it necessary to repackage Adult Education, which the NDC was much criticised for practising.
"The NPP then in opposition had persistently called for the scrapping of the non-formal education policy and vehemently criticised the then government of going in for a World Bank loan to implement the programme," he said.
Ms Hanna Tetteh-Kpodar and Mrs Ama Benyiwa-Doe NDC members Awutu-Senya and Gomoa-West, respectively, said the address lacked focus and direction and was vague on women's development.
"Women issues are not only embedded in the macro-economics and the creation of a Ministry for their affairs. It is deeper than that. The Ministry of Women and Children's Affairs must have a focus and a policy framework to operate with. There was nothing like that in the address. The address was rather more of an attack on the NDC", they said.
Dr Kwabena Adjei, NDC-Biakoye said the speech brooded over policies without any in depth analysis and it was a revisionist one, which portrayed Kufuor's administration as having no knowledge and grasp of the nation's problems.
He said: "How do you talk about modernising agriculture without taking into consideration the weather, the behaviour of farmers and credit as well as other forms of support to them?"
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Accra (Greater Accra) 01 February 2002 - President John Agyekum Kufuor was among dignitaries, who attended a reception held at the forecourt of the State House in Accra on Friday.
Accompanied by his wife, Theresa, Vice President Aliu Mahama and his wife Ramatu, they interacted with the people. The dignitaries included the Diplomatic Corps, Politicians, Parliamentarians, Chiefs and a cross-section of Ghanaians.
The reception was to climax activities that marked President Kufuor's Second Sessional address to the Second Session of the Third Parliament of the Fourth Republic of Ghana in the morning.
Highlights of President Kufuor's sessional address were his vision for the year prioritising infrastructure development and modernising agriculture. Other areas were enhanced social services with emphasis on health and education, good governance and private sector development.
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Kumasi (Ashanti Region) 01 February 2002 - The Kumasi Metropolitan Area recorded 451 cases of Tuberculosis last year, Dr (Mrs) Agatha Bonney, the Kumasi Metropolitan Director of Health Services, has announced.
Dr Bonney announced this at a press briefing held by the Kumasi Metropolitan Directorate of Health Services in Kumasi on Thursday on the health activities carried out by the directorate last year.
The forum was also used to review the Directorate's activities for the year 2001 and chart a more efficient course for the execution of their health activities for this year. She said 67 per cent of the cases were males but explained that it did not mean that men were more susceptible to the disease than women.
She, therefore, called on women, who detect any symptom of cough to also immediately report to the hospital rather than assuming that it was merely one of those ailments associated with womanhood.
The Metropolitan Director of Health Services also said between January and December last year, a total of 110 maternal deaths were reported to health facilities in Kumasi.
She, however, explained that only 57 out of the total number of maternal deaths that were reported came directly from Kumasi while the remaining 33 were referred from outside.
Dr Bonney said by the end of last year the number of babies screened for sickle cell since 1995 was 114,497. "Out of this figure, 2,217 representing 1.9 per cent had tested positive for sickle cell disease and this was in conformity with global expectation", she said.
Dr Bonney said the priority of the Directorate for this year was to promote the national health insurance scheme to cover both the formal and informal sectors while instituting measures to enhance the community based health programme.
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Accra (Greater Accra) 01 February 2002 - Mr Kwame Awuah Asante, former Commercial Controller of the Ghana Rubber Estates Limited (GREL), on Thursday told a Fast Track Court that the company made "political payments" between 1996 and 2000.
He said although he and the then Managing Director, Mr Etienne Popeler, were signatories to a total of 23 cheques GREL prepared in March 1998 in the name of certain companies, he did not know where the amounts involved were taken to.
Mr Asante, who said he joined GREL in November 1989 and rose through the ranks to become its Commercial Controller in September 1995, told the court that all the cheques were drawn at the Barclays Bank branch in Takoradi.
He was giving evidence for the prosecution in the case in which Hanny Sherry Ayittey, former Executive Member of the 31st December Women's Movement and three others are standing trial at an Accra Fast Track Court (FTC) on various charges of corruption in connection with the divestiture of GREL.
The three are Emmanuel Amuzu Agbodo, former Executive Secretary of the Divestiture Implementation Committee (DIC), Ralph Casely-Hayford, a businessman and Satirieh Dorcas Ocran, a housewife.
All the accused persons has pleaded not guilty and the court presided over by Mr Justice J. C. Amonoo-Monney has granted each self-recognisance bail. Led in evidence by Mr Osafo Sampong, Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), Mr Asante said in 2000, they could not make any "political payments."
He said when he enquired from the Managing Director in November 2000 what those "political payments" were for, his only response was "the least I know about it, the better".
Mr Asante told the court that in February last year, after GREL had submitted reports to Paris, the Head Office of Societe Industrielle Plantation Herea (SIPH), the French Company that won GREL's divestiture, he was queried about the withdrawals and payments made by the company that reflected in those reports.
He said Mr Oliver de Saint Sienne, Chairman of the company's Board, came to Ghana on February 15 last year and demanded that a letter was written to make those payments official. The witness said auditors were appointed to investigate those withdrawals and on March 1, 2001, after giving them his report, he resigned from the company.
During cross-examination, Mr David Lamptey, counsel for Ayittey, suggested to Mr Asante that he was gaining from those "political payments" and that was why he failed to raise eyebrows when they were made.
In answer to another question by counsel for Casely-Hayford, the witness told the court that after the divestiture, another company called New Jen Investments Limited gained 15 per cent shares of GREL's equities. The case was adjourned to Tuesday, February 5.
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Accra (Greater Accra) 01 February 2002 - The former Minister of Finance, Kwame Peprah, who is facing charges of conspiracy to commit crime and wilfully causing financial loss of over 20 million dollars to the state, on Thursday said he acted in good faith in the Quality Grain Project.
"As a Finance Minister, I was always sourcing funds for the project to sustain it, with due care and also took operational steps to ensure that operational loss did not occur," he said.
Peprah was answering questions during cross-examination by Mr Osafo Sampong, Director of Public Prosecution (DPP), at the Fast Track Court, presided over by Mr Kwame Afreh, an Appeal Court Judge sitting with additional responsibility as a High Court Judge.
Other accused persons charged severally with the offence are Ibrahim Adam, a former Minister of Food and Agriculture, Samuel Dapaah, former Chief Director of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture, George Yankey, former Director of the Legal Sector, Private and Financial Institutions Division of the Ministry of Finance and Ato Dadzie, former Chief of Staff.
They have all denied the charges and are on self-recognisance bail. Mr Peprah argued that he did not go off his schedule to release funds for the Aveyime Rice Project. He therefore disagreed with the Prosecution that he was reckless in the administration of the project, saying that he was mandated by Cabinet to act accordingly.
Peprah also disagreed with a suggestion by the Prosecution that when Quality Grain came to be established in Ghana, it was penniless.
When the Prosecution told Peprah that Mrs Cotton and her company abandoned the project due to his inability to ensure prudent management of the project and also that it was through his carelessness that the former Vice President sought the assistance of the Chinese Government in the project, he replied that the steps which were taken were rather to ensure that the project did not collapse.
Peprah, who was shown two pages of listed equipment by the Prosecution, which were meant for the project, to enable him to refresh his memory, told the court that he was not an agriculture expert to know, which of them were only suitable for clearing the land for the take off of the project.
He said all that he knew about the equipment was that they were basically needed for land clearing and that it was personnel from the agriculture sector that could have a fair knowledge to answer questions on the matter.
Meanwhile, the attorney for Peprah, Mr Kwaku Baah had said there was the need to invite the former President Jerry John Rawlings to give evidence in the case. Proceedings continue on Friday.
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