Minister Charges On ECG

The eastern regional Minister, Samuel Ofosu-Ampofo, yesterday charged on the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG), over its arbitrary action of interrupting supply of power even when there was an important national programme taking place at Koforidua, in the Eastern region, which needed urgent power supply. The regional minister was completely incensed when electricity supply to the national delegates� conference of the National Association of Local Authorities of Ghana (NALAG), which took place at the Eredec Hotel in Koforidua, was cruelly interrupted just as he took the podium to address the conference. That did not deter him though, as he went ahead to give his speech with his loud voice. The minister did not understand why power supply should be interrupted when such an important national programme was taking place and said he would definitely summon the regional manager of the ECG to his office to answer for such negligence. �I don't want to believe that people will misinterpret my action to be witch-hunting because such negligence has to be answered for�, he said. He also wondered why contingency arrangements were not in place to forestall such eventualities, while other people at the conference also wondered whether the hotel did not have a power plant to supply power at critical times. In his actual address, Mr. Ofosu-Ampofo, fumed over the reckless dissipation of resources at the various district assemblies, saying that the National Democratic Congress (NDC) is going to watch with �eagles eyes�, how all resources at those levels are used. According to him, the level of corruption in the metropolitan, municipal and district assemblies is unacceptable. He added that funds meant for development with the intention to alleviate poverty at the grass root level are recklessly disbursed, while those who have been voted to represent the people at the assembly look on. �The practice in the past where District Chief Executives (DCEs) unilaterally authorized the administrator of the District Assemblies Common Fund to make deductions at source for services not procured by the assemblies is very unfortunate and all efforts should be made to stop it�, he said, adding that the Minister for Local Government and Rural Development should be able to direct the administrator of Common Funds to stop that practice. He indicated that the NDC government was ready to motivate all assembly members to do their work effectively in the assemblies. He also advised district assemblies to pull their resources together and form consortiums so they could save money for more development. The Minister for Local Government and Rural Development, Mr. Joseph Yieleh Chireh, for his part, said the NDC government would be holding a stakeholders forum on decentralization in Ghana and therefore asked NALAG for its inputs at the forum. He also asked the associations of local governments to employ all its advocacy, lobbying and collaborative tools to ensure that the Local Government Service (LGC) which is at its teething stage, functions effectively.