A seminar on the 2003 Budget has been held
in London
Accra (Greater Accra) 20 March 2003-
The Reverend Apostle Brigadier (rtd) Albert Tehn-Addy, former Border Guard Commander, on Wednesday told
the National Reconciliation Commission (NRC) that he admonished a member of the
defunct Provisional National Defence Council (PNDC) for the summary execution
of some prisoners.
He said admonished Ex-Warrant
Officer Class One Joseph Kwabena Adjei Boadi, a
member of the PNDC for shooting six prisoners kept in the guardroom of the
Border Guard Headquarters in 1983.
The former Border Guard
Commander said he first saw the prisoners, who he learnt were former military
intelligence officers, a day before their summary execution. "They were
not armed, they did not pose any threat to anybody," he said.
Tehn-Addy was giving evidence in connection
with the shooting of five former military intelligence officers. They included
Samuel Gyimah, whose son, Fred Gyimah, on Tuesday in a testimony mentioned
Adjei Boadi as the one who ordered the soldiers out
of the guardroom when they were having a meal and "sprayed" his
father and the four others to death on
Adjei Boadi
who was at the NRC sat taciturn, very close to his counsel, Agyare
Koi Larbi, with whom he
occasionally conferred, during Tehn-Addy's narration Tehn-Addy said he had difficulty remembering the date of
the execution but recalled that after a coup attempt and jail break by Lance
Corporal Giwa he had information that six prisoners
had been brought in by Adjei Boadi.
Tehn-Addy said he went on an inspection of
the guardroom, and "found six young men barefooted in their trousers and asked
them why they were there, but they said they didn't know." He said he did
not press further.
He said he then went to have
lunch, but just as he was finishing the lunch, he had a call reporting a
shooting incident at the Headquarters. He asked that the victims should be sent
to the hospital to receive medical attention.
The former Border Guard
Commander said the caller insisted that he wanted him to see what had happened
before conveying the victims to the hospital. Tehn-Addy
said considering the violent events of the time, he loaded his gun with 28
rounds of bullets and a spare 28 attached to a magazine to face any eventuality
on the way.
"On arrival, I saw the
prisoners lying on the ground in front of my car. They were six of them. They
were the same people I saw before I went to lunch. ".... I asked the Guard
Commander who did the shooting, and he told me it was W. O. Adjei Boadi."
Tehn-Addy said he remarked that "if
that was what the PNDC wanted, let it be so". He asked the Guard Commander
to ring the 37 Military Hospital for an ambulance to
"collect these people away" for possible revival.
He said he told the Guard
Commander to ask Adjei Boadi to see him and he came
one week later. Tehn-Addy said when Adjei Boadi came, he scolded him for
executing the prisoners.
He said he told Adjei Boadi that with his high position as a member of the PNDC,
he should not have been involved in the shooting of the prisoners. Tehn-Addy said he also reminded him of the consequences of
the role of another member of the PNDC, Amartey Kwei, in a similar shooting incident.
When the Commission asked Tehn-Addy why he did not ask Adjei Boadi
his reason for executing the prisoners, he said it was not his business to ask that
question.
"In a revolution, if you
dare ask such questions, that is the easiest way to get out of this
world." Commission: "Did you inform the families of the
incident?" Tehn-Addy: "It was not our
business. When they get to the
Commission: "How do you now
feel towards Adjei Boadi?" Tehn-Addy:
"When a man repents, God forgives or mitigates his punishments. If he
repents he will be forgiven."
During cross-examination Koi Larbi asked Tehn-Addy questions about whether he was aware of a search
and 'destroy operation' and instruction to shoot anyone wearing a tracksuit
after a failed coup attempt but he replied, "I'm not aware".
Tehn-Addy said he remembered there was an
uprising around the time of the shooting incident, but could not remember the
date. Tehn-Addy said he did not know Gyima's children whom he met for the first time at the
premises of the Commission a day earlier.
He said initially he did not
want to testify and added he shed tears when saw the children. Counsel
requested that the Commission deferred the reaction by Adjei Boadi to Tehn-Addy's evidence to
another time. However, the Commission Chairman Justice Kweku Amua-Sekyi said he could be heard immediately. Adjei Boadi's reaction was deferred to another day.
Rico Kwabena Ampadu
a former furniture manufacturer, and owner of Star Furniture
and Upholstery in
He said the total cost of the items were 681,000 by then but a number of attempts
he made to get his money was futile, and his lawyer advised him to stop
pursuing the case. He said he had to sell his house at Abossey
Okai and other business at Oda and Nkawkaw to pay
some of his debts.
Ampadu also said the Military, Police
and personnel from the Fire Service looted his furniture storeroom at Okaishi following the
GRi.../
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Accra (Greater Accra) 20 March 2003-
The National Democratic Congress (NDC) on Wednesday accused the ruling New
Patriotic Party (NPP) of using fraudulent means to win the Bimbila, Kumawu and Wulensi by-elections.
"Voter bribery both in cash
and in kind, community bribery through sudden Government facilities and
development projects, and the provision of top official with luxury vehicles as
part of electioneering have become a feature of these by-elections,"
Professor John Evans Atta Mills
NDC Flag bearer stated at a press conference in
Prof. Mills said "the NPP
has created an atmosphere of pervasive fear and intimidation that our people
believe that if they do not do their bidding, they will be done in. So workers, Civil Servants, Contractors, Businessmen/women and even
Chiefs are afraid to vote against the NPP."
The Former Vice President also
accused the "NPP of using Policemen without identification and
non-Policemen posing as Policemen in electoral fraud as well as transportation
of voters from other constituencies who were issued with new identification
cards for the purposes of impersonation".
He said other fraudulent
electoral tactics adopted by the NPP were the intimidation of officials and
supporters of opposition parties by macho men and other thugs who provided
cover for "what are essentially election stealing activities."
"All these amount to vote
buying and intimidation, which are offences under electoral laws of all
democratic countries. They deny the people of the right to freely choose their
representatives and render meaningless the underlying democratic tenet that the
will of the people prevails in a democracy.
"So the NPP may have won
the by-elections, let us wait and see if they can buy or intimidate the entire
country come the general elections next year, I can assure you that they cannot,
and we shall win," Prof Mills emphasized.
Prof. Mills who was a former
Commissioner of Internal Revenue Service (IRS) also accused the government of
an unconstitutional and illegal act by deferring payment of the District
Assemblies Common Fund and the Ghana Education Trust Fund (GETFund)
arrears and spreading it over three to five years.
He said none of the operative
enactments made for deferred payments; therefore, the 2003 Budget's proposal to
defer payment of the arrears was illegal. The NDC Flag bearer said it was
particularly unacceptable for payment of the two funds, which were constitutional, and statutory obligations to be deferred
while the HIPC funds that were discretionary payments were timely released and
disbursed.
He said in the scheme of things,
the GET Funds and the District Assemblies Common Funds took priority over the
HIPC funds as they impacted directly on the district level development as
determined by the people through their Assemblies.
He appealed to the government to
take steps to reverse this unconstitutional order of things by according
priority to the two statutory Funds adding "or the NDC will take all constitutional
steps to ensure that the law is complied with"
GRi.../
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
He was reacting to an alleged
threat issued by Sergeant Victor Prince Fiagbor of
the Fifth Infantry Battalion to a witness, Alex Kwame Yeboah on Tuesday after
Yeboah allegedly pointed to him as one of WO Nkwaantabisah's
"torture men".
Justice Amuah-Sekyi
advised Yeboah to give the full details of the alleged threat to the Executive
Secretary of the Commission for further investigations to be conducted into the
matter.
Sergeant Fiagbor
who had earlier denied that soldiers at the harbour maltreated and mishandled
workers as alleged by Yeboah, could not answer a question by Ms. Sylvia Boye, a member of the Commission that he was the same person
who wrote in his statement that some workers alleged to have stolen rice and
sugar were caught and drilled.
Fiagbor said he never knew Yeboah, who
claimed he severely beat him and asked him to crawl from Shed Four to the
harbour gate, until they met for questioning at the office of Major Courage Quashigah, then in charge of the Military Police.
"What Yeboah said was not true," Fiagbe
said.
Ms. Boye
cautioned him to speak the truth, as that was the only means through which the
Commission could get the facts to enable it to assuage the pain of persons who
had been dehumanised.
Yeboah told the Commission that
he was working with the Ghana Cargo Handling Company in 1984 as
"gangway", a security man who prevented people from entering the ship
to steal.
He said on
He said while he was going home
he saw a soldier called "No Way" who ordered him to sit in the
mixture of oil and water. "I showed him my card that I was a worker there
but he insisted I should sit in the mixture and slapped me."
Yeboah said he wanted to know
what he had done to warrant such treatment but this rather infuriated "No
Way" who used the butt of his gun to hit him making him fall in the
process.
He said at that stage, two
soldiers called Harbour Rawlings and Dzottor Fianu, joined in beating him. "Boxer", another
soldier, joined later. Yeboah said they beat him, removed his clothes and
soaked it into the dirty oil and rainwater.
"They also collected 700 dollars that the captain of the ship gave
me to buy lobsters for him and my 4,000 cedis and Omega wrist-watch."
He said "No Way"
attempted to shoot him but a police sergeant nearby prevented him from
shooting. Yeboah said Victor Fiagbor later joined and
asked him to crawl from Shed Four to the gate whilst he (Fiagbor)
caned him. He said the soldiers later asked him to go but he refused because he
wanted to know what he did to warrant the treatment.
Yeboah said he reported the case
to the Police CID as well as the Ghana News Agency (GNA) but he neither got a
reply nor see the story in the newspapers. He said due to the beatings he
started feeling pains in his stomach and had to undergo surgery because the
doctor said he suffered from internal bleeding. He said he was on admission for
a month.
Yeboah said he petitioned Major Quashigah who questioned the soldiers. He added that the
soldiers gave conflicting stories and claimed he stole a torchlight battery.
The case was later referred to Gondar Barracks.
He said friends and one Captain Obeng advised him to leave Tema and not to pursue the case
in order to save his life. Yeboah said he stayed in
He said the beatings he received
had resulted in a heart disease for which he had to visit the hospital every
two months. Yeboah said as a result he was unemployed and prayed the commission
for compensation and the return of the 700 dollars and the wristwatch.
Counsel for Fiagbor,
Ms Phillipa Dennis, said her client was nowhere near
the scene as he was detailed to arrest people who stole sugar and rice
elsewhere. She said Yeboah was trying to make his case "sweet'' to the
commission by adding names of soldiers who were not even present at the scene.
GRi.../
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
A seminar on the 2003 Budget has been held
in
Hon. J.H. Mensah, Senior Minister and Chairman of the Economic Management Team, and Mr. Kwasi Abeasi, Chief Executive of the Ghana Investment Promotion Centre led the discussions at the seminar.
In his presentation, Mr. Mensah outlined efforts the Government had within the past two years initiated to restore a stable macro economic framework to the economy.
He said despite the bold efforts, the economy would endure a long period of convalescence because of the depth of the sickness.
“Unless the tax base is broadened with revenue generation at a much more faster rate than what we are doing now, the nation will be in trouble,” he said.
To reverse the trend, Mr. Mensah called for expansion of the base of public finance to enable Government provide required services for the nation and advocated for the ultimate institution of systems to ensure the accelerated and rapid growth of the economy and reduction of Government debts.
Mr. Mensah appealed to Ghanaians in the Diaspora in the finance sector to help build a strong finance base for the country and emphasised that without it, industry would be handicapped.
He assured Ghanaians that all foreign accounts would be protected and announced, amidst cheers, that following Government intervention, the banks in the country had started paying interest on foreign accounts.
“I therefore urge you to consider increasing the level of your foreign accounts,” he said. On the proposed health insurance scheme, he said it would help eliminate the trauma of having to find money out of peoples’ pockets for treatment of diseases they had not budgeted for.
He said although some people might think it was ambitious for a poor country such as Ghana to have a health insurance scheme, the alternative would have been worse for people who required hospital care but had avoided going to hospital because of economic reasons.
Referring to petroleum products, Mr. Mensah said Government had to charge the right price in order to take care of the costs involved especially the price of crude oil and the foreign exchange rate factor.
With regards to the HIPC, he said there was no need for people to sneeze at it. He said the initiative had been beneficial, led to generous cancellation of loans by donor community and the release of resources for development in vital sectors, such as health and education especially in the rural areas.
Mr. Abeasi pointed out the Government was becoming more realistic with the national budget, a trend which, he said, should give hope to Ghanaians.
As realism is injected into the pricing of utilities, distortions in the economy would be minimised, he said. “The reason why we have not succeeded in the past is because the previous Government did not have the guts to take realistic decisions, he said”.
He declared: “It is important for us to realise that when you have a Government that at a risk of being unpopular, is prepared to take hard but necessary decisions, then we should all rally behind it”.
Touching on investments, Mr. Abeasi called on Ghanaians to help promote investment into the country by helping to create the right image and perception.
To Ghanaians who were not ready to return home, he urged them to consider investments in some of the areas identified in various “Presidential initiatives”.
Summing up, Mr Isaac Osei assured Ghanaians that the
The seminar was useful. It enabled Ghanaians to ask searching questions on matters of economic interest and growth of the economy.
Issues raised by participants centred, among other things,
on difficulties in clearing cheques.
Others were on increase in prices of petroleum products, development of
private public partnerships, the inefficiency of the telecommunications system,
the need to take measures to increase local production of rice and poultry and
measures being put in place to reduce poverty in the country.
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
War had become imminent
following United States (US) President George Bush's 48-hour ultimatum to Iraqi
President Saddam Hussein to quit his country or face war. According to a
release issued by the Ministry of Information and Presidential Affairs, the
Minister said this when he was addressing a New Patriotic Party (NPP) forum in
Tamale on Tuesday.
He said war in the gulf was bound
to affect crude oil prices, investment, donor support and tourism globally. Obestebi-Lamptey therefore, called on Ghanaians "to
understand the tough situation if it does arise and support government".
He said the government was on
course in its goal of delivering positive change to the people, adding that the
government had chalked gains as far as the macro economic growth was concerned.
GRi.../
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
"Ordinary Ghanaians are
going to exercise our constitutional and democratic right to show in no
uncertain terms our disapproval of the intolerable and worsening economic
conditions into which we have been forced by the ruling New Patriotic Party
(NPP) government," he told a packed press conference in
Flanked by former ministers of
state and Members of Parliament, Prof. Mills without indicating when to embark
on the demonstration said, "As flagbearer of the NDC, I can no longer
ignore the persistent calls from Ghanaians from all walks of life to lead them
in a peaceful demonstration."
According to the NDC, the press
conference was to assure Ghanaians that the party was aware of the choking
pressure of growing economic hardship that was being piled on them by the
government.
Prof. Mills accused the
government of numerous acts of omission and commission thereby, aggravating the
plight of the ordinary Ghanaian stressing that the government spent most part
of last year "chasing the mirage" of the one billion IFC loan.
He said other acts as the Sahara
Energy Company deal to lift crude oil for the country, the Castle and ministers
bungalow rehabilitation, the purchase of bullet-proof vehicles for the
President at a cost of 500,000 US dollars and the numerous presidential trips
abroad as a drain on the economy.
The NDC flagbearer again accused
the government of frivolously spending 90,000 US dollars on an S-Class Mercedes
Benz car for the Speaker of Parliament who is the immediate past Chairman of
the NPP.
The importation of 3.2 billion
cedis worth of mango seedlings by Professor Kassim Kasanga Minister of Lands and Forestry, which got perished
because they arrived in the dry season and the huge sum of money spent on the countless
number of Presidential Staffers and Special Assistants had all combined to run
the economy to the ground, he said.
"Instead of working to keep
the economy on an even keel, the NPP Government takes refuge in media and
propaganda spins and on creating diversions from the economic plight of today's
Ghanaian."
Prof. Mills said proceedings at
the National Reconciliation Commission (NRC) are part of the orchestrated
diversionary tactics by the government. "But we refuse to be diverted. I
am therefore, using this opportunity to advise the NPP Government to ease the
economic and financial pressure on our people," he said. "The people
just cannot and will not bear any more of the crushing yoke of the price and
cost increase," the NDC flag bearer added.
GRi.../
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
He said the increase of about
45.1 percent is due to the identification and inclusion in the assembly's
valuation list of new properties, through the renumbering exercise and
increased privatisation of the collection of rates and fees.
Ofei Darko told the third ordinary
meeting of the third AMA session, that identification of untapped sources of
revenue, intensification and enforcement of measures, including arrests to
check leakage and other acts of indiscipline and corruption in revenue collection,
as other factors that contributed to the growth in revenue.
Improvement in the equipment for
billing, purchase of new vehicles to boost logistics in revenue collection,
enforcement of byelaws on rate defaulters also helped the AMA, he said.
He cited the closure of the
business premises of Standard Chartered and Barclays Banks and said this action
prompted other defaulters to rush and settle their indebtedness to the
Assembly.
"I must admit that the
closure of the premises of these reputable financial institutions was an
unpleasant exercise but we were compelled to take this measure as a last resort
to generate funds to arrest the mounting pressure of paying for very essential
services and also avoid the catastrophe of serious epidemics in the city."
Darko announced that more measures
such as house numbering, new property identification for valuation and digital
mapping and property identification projects would be employed vigorously to
achieve more than the set target for this year.
He announced that within the
past two years, the AMA had provided 12,968 mono and dual desks for basic schools,
1,671 teachers' tables and chairs and 161 cupboards. By the end of this year,
all classrooms in
The AMA boss said the Assembly
also rehabilitated 26 school buildings while 21 new ones under its supervision
were under construction with financial support of the International Development
Association (IDA) and the British Department for International Development.
Ofei Darko said the assembly spent
about 60 million cedis on scholarships for 120 needy but brilliant pupils in
the JSS and Senior Secondary Schools (SSS) and would start sponsorship for
teacher trainees this year.
He said the assembly had
undertaken a number of development projects during the year under review with
funds mainly from the District Assemblies Common Fund, the Road Fund, AMA
internally generated funds and assistance from donors.
"Projects under the HIPC
Relief are also in progress in the communities. We have so far received 1.75 billion
(50 percent) of the funds allocated to the AMA to support these project,"
he said.
GRi.../
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Accra (Greater Accra) 20 March 2003-
France on Tuesday said it stood by its earlier decision that the recourse to
force in Iraq should be the last resort after all other options had been
exhausted.
President Jacques Chirac in an
address made at the
The French Embassy in
On the Ultimatum issues by US President
George Bush, he said, "regardless of the forthcoming developments, this
ultimatum is calling into question our idea of international relations. It
affects the future of a people, the future of a region, world stability."
"Whether it's a matter of
the necessary disarmament of
President Chirac said it was a
grave decision to go to war at a time when Iraqi disarmament was underway and
that there was proof that there were credible alternatives of disarming that
country.
"It is also a decision
which jeopardizes future use of methods to resolve peacefully crises linked to
the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction." He said
He appealed to all to respect
international law and maintain the unity of the Security Council by staying
within the framework set by the council's Resolution 1441. "To act outside
the authority of the United Nations, to prefer the use of force to compliance
with the law, would incur a heavy responsibility."
GRi.../
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Accra (Greater Accra) 20 March 2003-
The National Democratic Congress (NDC) on Wednesday spiked rumours that it would
withdraw its candidate from the Navrongo Central
bye-election and support the People's National Convention (PNC) candidate.
"The National Executive
Committee wishes to refute the bogus propaganda going on in some sections of
the media that the NDC will withdraw its candidate for the Navrongo
Central by-election and support the PNC candidate," the NDC said in a
statement released in
"We wish to make it
categorically clear that the NDC will contest the election in the candidature
of Clement Bugase," the statement signed by Dr Nii Josiah-Aryeh, general secretary of the NDC said.
The NDC said third campaign is
already on course and called on all members, supporters and sympathisers to
disregard the negative propaganda and continue to work hard to capture the
seat. The seat became vacant following the death of the MP John Achuliwor, through a motor accident. He was also the Deputy
Minister of Communication and Technology.
GRi.../
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Wednesday said the high cost the
Supreme Court was awarding against people seeking to have the interpretation of
constitutional provisions was doing damage to the development of democracy.
The Supreme Court on 4 March
slapped a 15 million cedis cost against one Charles Bo Amissah,
who was seeking the interpretation of the constitutionality of charges
preferred against certain public officials in the former NDC government.
Amissah later discontinued the action
saying that his decision was personal. Again the Supreme Court had awarded a cost
of 10 million cedis against Tsatsu Tsikata in the
famous unconstitutionality of the
Bagbin speaking to the Ghana
News Agency said such high costs would scare would-be plaintiffs to the court. He
said there was the need for people to have the courage to test the law and the
provisions of the Constitution at the Supreme Court for the protection of their
rights.
Bagbin said such an exercise was
one of the healthy ways of developing the rule of law and to make the citizenry
to understand how those laws operated. "It could even be that the many
laws we have on the statute books and in the Constitution if effectively put to
the test, there would be less need of adding new laws to the existing ones which
were not being put to the test.
"It should be a healthy
sign that those seeking the interpretation of the Constitution would have no
inhibitions or fears about high cost the court would award against them. That would do a lot of good for our young democracy."
On the creation of new districts
and constituencies, Bagbin cautioned that the issue should be approached
systematically so that it did not create unnecessary tension and rancour among
the people.
It might be necessary to create
districts first before trying to create constituencies so that the exercise
would not contradict the demands of the Constitution and that it was healthy
that the Electoral Commission (EC) had said that it was still in consultation
to determine how the exercise would be carried out.
He said Article 47 (2) and (4)
said no constituency shall fall within more than one region neither should it
fall within two districts. He said the Constitution empowered EC to review and
demarcate constituencies at interval of not less than seven years or within 12
months after the publication of a population census or which ever came first.
Bagbin said following from
earlier pronouncements, his fear was that there were discrepancies in
statements made by top government officials about the creation of
constituencies and districts.
He said Papa Owusu-Ankomah, the
Majority Leader and Kwadwo Baah-Wiredu, Minister of Local Government and Rural
Development, were on different wavelengths on the number of districts to be
created.
Bagbin said it might be necessary
to solve the problem of demarcating the Winneba area, because it was posing a
problem. He said the demand from the Volta and Brong Ahafo Regions that separate
regions should be created should also be taken into serious account because that
exercise could only be undertaken through referendum.
GRi.../
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Tamale (Northern Region)
In this regard, government was
sourcing funding from the World Bank and the HIPC Fund to refurbish and provide
furniture for all District Information offices in the country.
Jake Obetsebi-Lamptey, Minister of
Information and Presidential Affairs announced this when he interacted with
Regional and District Information Officers drawn from the Northern, Upper West
and Upper East Regions in Tamale on Tuesday.
He said every District
Information Office would have a Website and be linked to satellite to enable it
to access information quickly. He announced that the Ministry had acquired four
new cinema vans while all the old ones would be repaired, adding that the
government was also exploring the possibility of acquiring motorcycles for some
of the officers.
The Minister said Information
Officers would also undergo training to equip them with skills and knowledge to
carry out their duties more professionally. Jake Obetsebi-Lamptey said as part of
the transformation exercise, workers of the Ministry would have to change their
attitude to work by being innovative and using alternative means of mass
communication to inform and educate the public instead of relying on the only
equipment they currently had.
"This demands commitment of
the workers since without commitment, every good policy will fail". The
Minister said communication had become the bedrock of development so
information professionals needed to know how to communicate to the people to
let them understand perfectly the message they were sending across.
"Information flow is a
two-way affair and this demands that government should know the truth about the
people's reactions to its programmes and policies". Government, he said,
would continue to consult the people before implementing its programmes to help
deepen the country's democracy.
Obetsebi-Lamptey said the role
of the media in helping to deepen the country's young democracy was, therefore,
critical since the government and the governed would rely on the media for
accurate information to make informed decisions. Abdulai
Mahama, Northern Regional Information Officer, appealed to the Minister to
expedite action on the renovation of District Information Offices.
GRi.../
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Dunkwa-on-Offin (Central Region)
This is because of the need to
meet the government's target under the National Forest Plantation Development
Programme aimed at re-planting all degraded forests. The Deputy Minister of
Lands and Forestry, Thomas Broni said this when he
inspected a 90-hectare plantation at Tegyemoso, near Dunkwa-on-Offin as part of his two-day tour of the Central
Region to inspect re-planted forests.
About 1,000 farmers are
replanting degraded forests in the
Broni said under the National Forest
Plantation Development Programme each farmer would get 40 per cent of the
proceeds from the sale of the trees, the Forest
Commission would take 40 per cent with the remaining 20 per cent going to the
landowner (Chief).
He later presented 155 pairs of
GRi.../
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Kumasi (Ashanti Region) 20 March
2003- A paediatrician on Wednesday appealed to nursing mothers who are HIV/AIDS
to breastfeed their babies exclusively for first six months despite the risk of
the babies getting infected through breast-milk.
Dr Sampson Antwi,
a Paediatrician at the Komfo Anokye Teaching hospital
(KATH), said this is because breast-milk had been found to contain some
substances that protected babies from getting infected with the HIV virus.
He was speaking on ''feeding HIV
children born to HIV mothers'' at a seminar on the prevention of mother-to-child
transmission of HIV/AIDS. Dr Antwi said babies who
were exclusively breastfed without water and other artificial foods might not
be infected with the virus.
He said 25-35 percent of babies
born to HIV positive mothers stood the risk of getting the disease from their
mothers, one third of this percentage could get it through breast-milk, one
third through pregnancy and another one third at labour.
Besides, Dr Antwi
said, the introduction of other artificial feeds and water when the child was
being breastfed made the baby develop small sores in the intestines that
increased the child's vulnerability to the virus.
The one-day seminar was organised
by the Serwaa Ampem AIDS Foundation
for Children headed by Nana Adwoa Adwapa,
wife of Otumfuo Osei Tutu 11, Asantehene, in
collaboration with the World Health Organisation (WHO).
GRi.../
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Accra (Greater Accra) 20 March 2003-
The Third World Water Forum was told on Wednesday that the world spends 40
times more for petroleum each year than it invests in water and sanitation
infrastructure and maintenance, a sign of misplaced priorities.
Olivier Bommelaer
of the Seine-Normandy River Basin Organization in
"If you include operation
and maintenance, the total budget of water supply and sanitation is around 165
billion dollars - a mere 0.55 of global GDP," Bommelaer
added.
He said in a statement received
by GNA in
The statement said how to
finance water development projects and who should pay for them are topics of
increasing importance at international water meetings. A major panel on finance
will be held at the Forum on Friday, which will be chaired by Michel Camdessus, former International Monetary Fund managing
director.
The Third World Water Forum,
meeting in three different Japanese cities - Kyoto, Shiga, Osaka – from 16-23
March has been convened to debate ways to solve the global water crisis, which
has left 1.2 billion people without safe water supply and 2.4 billion without
secure sanitation.
GRi.../
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Sogakope (Volta Region)
A computerised Lands Commission
Management Information System (LCMIS) would soon be in place, Hamidu Ibrahim Baryeh, Executive Secretary of the Lands Commission, told an
annual review meeting being attended by 40 officers of the Commission on
Tuesday at Sogakope, in the Volta Region.
The system would automate some
of the public land management functions including rent assessment, billing, and
recording of payments and consent processes. It is also envisaged that all the
relevant land documents would be scanned for storage under the system.
Baryeh said consultants have recommended
that the LCMIS be developed on an industry standard software platform, such as
Oracle, adding the report of the consultants had been forwarded to the Sector
Minister for approval for work to commence on the project.
On revenue generation, he said a
new separate revenue unit was being created within the Greater-Accra office, which
would be provided with the full complements of staff and logistics and would be
responsible for all rent administration issues.
He said the unit would be
replicated in Sekondi and
"We must begin to define
pragmatic strategies to carry out some of our other mandates that we have left
largely unattended to since the passage of the Lands Commission Act in
1994," he stressed.
Baryeh said the Commission was obliged
to actively participate in land title registration in the country, which was
mandatory, adding, "so far the modalities for performing this role had not
been clearly defined".
He reminded the participants
that their focus for the year was to restore public confidence in their work through
focused improved service delivery. During the five-day review meeting participants
would deliberate on proposals for 2003-Policy Directions and Operations,
National Report, Presentation of Regional Reports and would take a field visit
to the Keta Sea Defence Project Site.
GRi.../
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com
Sunyani (Brong Ahafo)
Cab Beyuo, the prosecutor, told
the court that the accused and the deceased, Madam Fabea,
40 lived in the same area at Kontonso. He said on
The residents, on their return
from the funeral in the evening, realized that the deceased had not returned from
her farm and were alarmed. The following day they went to deceased's farm where
they found her body with a gunshot wound on her left hand and informed the
police.
Beyuo said the accused left the
village after the discovery of the body and this made the residents to suspect
that he had killed the woman. He said the accused later confessed to his uncle,
Nindo Komba at Yendi, and the uncle handed him over to the police. Beyuo
said the accused admitted the offence and told the police he suspected the
woman of bewitching him.
GRi.../
Send your comments to viewpoint@ghanareview.com