Compiled by Richard Attenkah
Joseph Nii Laryea Afotey Agbo, Greater Accra Regional Minister, has said that more often than not, technocrats and other functionaries within the various assemblies express so much interest in the awarding of contracts for projects than how the execution of such contracts go.
He has consequently cautioned such technocrats and other functionaries to desist from fronting and interfering with the award of contracts, but rather show interest in how such contracts would be monitored and completed.
“You are, therefore, advised to desist from fronting and interfering in award of contracts, show of interest and personal bias in people or contractors who win contracts through the due process of the procurement law,” he explained.
Nii Laryea Afotey Agbo continued; “You are to do due diligence, and to supervise contracts that are awarded. In many instances, some technocrats would frustrate legitimate contractors for the fact that they are not their ‘favourites.’ Please, let those who qualify and win contracts from this Assembly work without any administrative interference and bottlenecks.”
The Regional Minister was speaking at the Third Ordinary General Assembly meeting of the Third Session of the Kpone-Katamanso District Assembly (KKDA) at Kpone on Thursday.
He called on management and members of the Assembly to endeavour to purchase a grader so it can be used to do routine graveling, shaping and maintenance of roads in the Kpone-Katamanso district, until the Assembly’s finances improve to be able to tar the roads.
According to him, his office had been informed about the nature of works required to make the roads in the area motorable, saying he had already taken the steps to get those roads fixed as soon as possible.
On the issue of inter-district boundary disputes affecting revenue mobilisation of the various Assemblies, the Regional Minister hinted that his office had been very instrumental in finding amicable solutions to the issues to ensure that equity and fairness are applied.
He assured the Assembly that soon all that will be a thing of the past, saying he was aware of the adverse effects the boundary disputes were having on their revenue mobilisation drive, hence his commitment to have the issue resolved amicably and timely.
Nii Laryea Afotey Agbo challenged the Assembly to find new ways to generate revenue for itself, and not continue to rely on the Common Fund and District Development Fund (DDF) as most Assemblies have been doing.
He stated; “There are a lot of revenue generating items such as property rate, development permits, fees, street parking and fines including night tolls and fees for businesses in your areas of operation that you should explore further to improve your IGF”.
Alhaji Anteaye Tetteh, District Chief Executive (DCE) of the KKDA, announced recommendations made by the executive committee of the Assembly in a report they submitted at the Third Ordinary General Assembly Meeting.
As part of measures to generate revenue for the Assembly, the committee recommended that they go after the Tema Metropolitan Assembly (TMA) to recover a sum of GH¢140,000 belonging to the KKDA.
These are monies, which, according to the committee, were to be collected by officials of KKDA, but for whatever reasons, officials of TMA either deliberately collected it from the source, or the monies were wrongly paid to them.
They include building permit fee of GH¢80,000 collected from UT Properties at Saasabi, near Oyibi, GH¢26,000 property rate and GH¢34,000 business operating permit (BOP) which were wrongfully paid to them early this year by BOST and the Kpone Landfill.
The committee further recommended that management of the Assembly should establish an advertising promotional unit to cater for the mounting of signposts, and also come up with a programme to sensitise members of the community to pay their property rates.
Furthermore, the committee recommended that the name of the Ashaiman timber market and other properties within its jurisdiction bearing the name of other Assemblies should be changed to Kpone-Katamanso District Assembly.
According to the DCE, the committee also recommended that the Assembly should regularise all lorry stations in the district, by setting up toll booths at all entrances to beef up revenue generation from those facilities.
The committee recommended that the Assembly revisit its welfare scheme, and make it operational, as well as actuate the scholarship scheme to support brilliant but needy students in the district.
To safeguard farmlands in the districts, the committee recommended that the Assembly abrogate all sand winning permits or contracts issued by the TMA before the creation of the KKDA.
With regards to land earmarked for a block farming programme by the Ministry of Food and Agriculture, the committee recommended that the Assembly arrest the youth of the various communities who issue sand winning way-bills to perpetuate illegal sand winning in the area.