Speaking to Citi News, the Deputy Executive Director of the Centre, Gladys Naadu Tetteh, said the demands from the Coordinating Council were unfortunate, and steps must be taken to discourage such a practice from becoming the norm.

[contextly_sidebar id=”zuMVOsmT3B71kgFot7PkSt27xGKoqZdG”]According to her, when the president visits MMDAs, they often overspend and in several cases overstate their expenditure.

Per the new local government Act, the Regional Coordinating Councils (RCCs), are supposed to receive a percentage of the Common Fund to undertake their activities.

She insisted that, if the president is coming to their region, the RCCs should use their percentage of the common fund and not burden the districts.

“When the president visits MMDAs, they overspend and even though sometimes they spend much less, they quote higher figures. So even though the RCC directive to the MMDA is not good, for me I think we should discourage that. Definitely, the presidency has their budget. This is coming from the RCC. It is the RCC which is the coordinating body within the region which is asking the Assemblies to pay. Per the new Local Government Act, they are supposed to get a percentage of the common fund to undertake their activities or operations. So they should not burden the assemblies with all their other expenses,” she said.

“Probably because the president would be moving through the district, you know the assembly too would be a little petty probably (that’s what I suspect), that’s why this amount of money is being requested. If they have received it and the letter has gone to them then the RCC needs to be talked to, I won’t use the word sanctioned, but I think they need to be talked to, to take a second look at some of the things they are doing in the region,” she added.

‘Don’t pay for President’s trips’

Meanwhile, the Northern Regional Minister, Salifu Saeed, has directed all Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDAs) in the region to disregard a circular which requested them to pay Ghc5,000 each to fund President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo’s three-day official visit beginning October 6.

The Minister in an official statement copied to citifmonline. com implied that, his office did not endorse the earlier memo.

The statement however admitted that, the Metropolitan, Municipal and District Chief Executives’ caucus in the region, voluntarily made the earlier proposal which his office did not endorse.

Salifu Saeed has therefore dismissed the earlier memo which went viral on both mainstream and social media.

According to him, the President’s trip is to be fully sponsored by the Presidency.

The Local Government Ministry has also denied asking the Regional Coordinating Council; to contribute that amount after it emerged that a circular had been sent to all district assemblies.

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By: Michael Ogbodu /citifmonline.com/Ghana

The post Group slams Northern RCC over botched ‘payment’ for Nana Addo’s trip appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.

The Metropolitan, Municipal and District Chief Executives’ (MMDCEs) caucus of the Northern Region, say they took the decision  by themselves in order to place a ceiling on the amount to contribute, to avoid instances where MMDAs are forced to overspend for such trips.

[contextly_sidebar id=”vDYAuOAJEIbsXtZRUwGFSPCROtXAXu78″]But according to O.B Amoah, the Ministry has not authorized any such payment as being imposed by the Northern Regional Coordinating Council on the 26 MMDAs in the region.

Citi News gathered that, the Northern Regional Coordinating Council had tasked each of the 26 MMDAs in the 3 regions of the North to contribute GH¢ 5,000 each to make arrangements towards President Akufo Addo’s visit which begins today [Monday].

The Northern Regional Minister, Alhassan Issahaku in a leaked memo urged the MMDAs to treat the matter with “urgency” ahead of the President’s visit.

According to the leaked letter, the amount must be paid by close of day on Monday to ensure a successful organization of the President’s tour of the Northern Region.

But the Akuapem South legislator, O. B. Amoah, in an interview on the Citi Breakfast Show said the Ministry has not sanctioned such levy.

“As far as we are concerned, this is not sanctioned and nobody is authorized to pay anything towards the president’s visit. The Presidential office will have their own arrangement when it comes to such trips. And I expect that the RCC should be able to know that this is not the situation where you should ask any district to make any contribution towards the president’s visit,” he said.

“It is unknown and not sanctioned… I don’t think it is the right thing to do. If for any situation the president visits a district and the district has to cater for some aspect of the visit, that should be well documented and authorized,” he added.

President Nana Akufo-Addo, is expected to tour the three regions of the north within seven days from Monday, October 2, 2017, to Sunday, October 8, 2017.

This follows similar tours of the Ashanti and Western Regions earlier in 2017.

What has been the practice?

Assemblies bearing part of the cost for presidential visits is not new.

Although the presidency has its own budgetary allocation, assemblies in all successive governments are often forced to bear part of such cost for the president’s trips, despite the huge financial challenges most of them are faced with, which hampers development.

Sadly, most of these assemblies have not received their full budgetary allocations from the Central Government, and they also generate very little on their own.

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By: Jonas Nyabor/citifmonline.com/Ghana

The post Don’t pay for Nana Addo’s visit – O.B Amoah to MMDAs appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.

According to the Service, the report of such development is ‘misleading’ and does not reflect the true situation.

According to the Local Government Service (LGS), it is currently reshuffling Coordinating Directors of all the 10 regional Coordinating Councils and Municipal, Metropolitan and District Assemblies.

It was reported in a section of the media last week that the 108 coordinating directors had been replaced.

The report said the government has relieved some 108 Municipal and District Coordinating Directors in the various Local Assemblies of their post and have replaced them by the postings of some new officers approved by the authorities under the service.

But a statement signed by Mr Joseph A. Ankamah, the Head of Public Affairs at the Office of the Head of Local Government Service (OHLGS), said the circulated story was untrue.

“The Office of the Head of the Local Government Services (OHLGS) wishes to inform the general public that both the caption and content of the said post is not correct and totally misleading as it does not reflect the true situation.”

“It must be noted that the OHLGS is responsible for the human resource management function of the LGS and in connection with this, an exercise is being undertaken to reshuffle Coordinating Directors across the 10 Regional Coordinating Councils (RCCs) and 216 Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDAs) in the country.”

The Service collaborates with other national institutions to facilitate ongoing local government reforms to ensure that local government administration measures up to international best practices.

It is also responsible for training and career development of the staff of local government institutions to ensure the delivery of value for money services.

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By: Jonas Nyabor/citifmonline.com/Ghana

The post Local Gov’t Service denies sacking staff appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.

He told Citi News he would be engaging the relevant stakeholders to ensure that the matter is amicably resolved.

Last Friday [March 23^rd, 2017], a vigilante group believed to be affiliated to the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP), stormed the premises of the Ashanti Regional Coordinating Council, demanding the removal of Mr. George Adjei.

The rowdy group destroyed state property and manhandled the appointee in a bloody attack.

According to the group, they cannot work with Mr. Adjei who was recently appointed by President Akufo-Addo.

They said he did not contribute to the party’s electoral success in the 2016.

They also demanded that one of their own be appointed instead of Mr. Adjei.

But speaking to Citi News, the Regional Minister said he has initiated moves to ensure the total resolution of the issue for calm to return to the Ashanti region.

Meanwhile, the police in the region have arrested one person in connection with the attack.

The suspect, Kwadwo Bamba, is believed to be the organiser of the vigilante group, Delta Force.

A statement from the Ghana Police Service said the suspect is currently assisting the Police with investigations.

The statement further asked those who were involved in the attack to report themselves to the Police. “We are also asking those who were involved to make themselves available to the Police because at all cost we will make sure that whoever is picked is made to face the full rigors of the law.”

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By: Felicia Osei/citifmonline.com/Ghana

The post Ashanti: Regional minister moves to resolve Security Coordinator row appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.

Kwabena Kwabena is unhappy about the state of Ghanaian music. The smooth-singing Highlife musician has stated that “there is no industry” in Ghana and MUSIGA must be blamed.

In an interview with enewsgh.com, he said MUSIGA has failed the Ghanaian musician.

“There are certain people who should make sure whatever we create yields benefits to us, and these are the people in the helm of affairs. The people managing the structures don’t even understand what they are doing. I don’t mean to criticize anyone but these guys are not doing great as long as far as governing the music industry is concerned. Ask any musician what they get from doing a hit record apart from being famous and being called a musician, so if you have a leader and he is not thinking about putting money in the pocket of the hit maker then what are we doing as a group? It’s simple; you ask yourself what the other developed countries are doing to put monies in their artist’s pocket. Why won’t you consult their expertise, I heard two million Ghana Cedis was giving to a company to check our contribution to the nation’s GDP. How does that benefit the musician?”

According to Kwabena Kwabena, a proper revenue collection system has to be put in place to ensure musicians get value for money. His suggestion was in reaction to the fact that MUSIGA invested heavily in a market research conducted by KPMG.

“First you fix the money collection system from the media houses and try and control how people steal the music, then after that you go and research and you will even get a handsome figure to show government. If we had checked the systems and shown good figures, we would have earned the respect of the government more. Put money in the musicians pocket through his work. If I had two million, I will go to the UK and consult them on how they collect the revenues for the work the musicians do, buy the software that will monitor the systems for us, then seek the government to help us make it mandatory for every media outlet to be on that monitoring scheme.”

He added that technological solutions be sought to fix the problems of the music industry in Ghana. According to him, the right technology and visionary leadership would go a long way to ensure the growth of the industry.

“We are in a technology era and we are still complaining about things like this, nobody cares about nobody. How long can an artist survive on his show money? If you are an artist, you think about how you can create your own team to help you build and move your career from one point to other and just hope it changes. I feel we can do due diligence to our selves, in life the moment you think selfless and think about achievements, that’s when you begin to head somewhere. Our main problem is we don’t understand our time and what to do with our time. That’s why I was happy to see a young man become the president and unfortunately things are yet to change. Every leader should have a vision everyone is following. That is why we submit to you and call you president. In the ancient world it’s the brave ones that got the chance to the throne. Leadership is more about action. I pray someone has a change of heart or we get someone who will change things.”

Kojo Akoto Boateng/citifmonline/Ghana

The post Kwabena Kwabena talks about Ghana music, jabs Obour appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.