Wa East Assembly members cry fowl over non payment of ex-gratia

Wa, Jan.31, GNA - Members of the Wa East District Assembly have expressed disappointment at what they describe as the lackadaisical attitud= e of the District Chief Executive (DCE), Mr. Ameen Salifu, towards the paymen= t of their ex-gratia.

Some of the aggrieved members who stormed the Ghana News Agency's Regional Office in Wa on Monday, said since the dissolution of the Wa East District Assembly on November 15, 2010, not a pesewa had been paid them and that there were no signs that the 700 Ghana Cedis agreed upon by the member= s would be paid now. Said one Assemblyman, 93As at now nothing has been paid to us and we still do not know when the Assembly would be able to pay us. "Mr. Salifu keeps on telling us that it would take the Assembly a ye= ar or more to mobilise money to be able to pay us because revenue generated internally was inadequate".

This assertion by the DCE, the assembly members said, could not be true because as at July last year, the assembly was able to collect 122,214.30 Ghana Cedis representing 123.48 per cent of the estimated revenu= e of 98,973.50 set for the year. They accused Mr. Salifu of using the money to pay for fuel bills and other commitments to the neglect of taking care of the welfare of the members who had worked hard to mobilise enough money for the assembly. The assembly members said since the appointment of Mr. Salifu as District Chief Executive, 200 million Ghana Cedis was approved by the assembly for the innovation of the DCE's bungalow to make it more habitab= le for him to stay but since then he had refused to stay at Funsi, the Distric= t capital, and rather chose to be commuting from Wa to Funsi on daily basis t= o transact official duties.

This practice, they said, had overburdened the finances of the assembl= y due to the payment of huge fuel bills and high maintenance cost of his official vehicle, thereby depleting the coffers of the assembly and also undermining the revenue mobilisation efforts of assembly members.

The assembly members also accused Mr. Salifu of showing a character of arrogance and gross disrespect for members of the assembly and community members and as having lost touch with the people in the district. The assembly members said Mr. Salifu was also not interested in the promotion of the human resource base of the district as he had always stood adamant towards supporting students in higher institutions with the payment of the school fees.

The assembly members said the district was therefore lagging behind in terms of human resource, notably in education, health and agriculture where personnel were lacking, while workers from other areas outside were also refusing posting to the district.

The assembly members said they would not cooperate with Mr. Salifu in th= e next assembly if he continued to drag his feet towards the payment of their ex-gratia and refused to change his style of administration of 93one man show".

Mr. Salifu, when contacted, said no assembly member had discussed payment of ex-gratia with him but admitted that the assembly at present has no sufficient money to pay the members.

He said the assembly would pay them their ex-gratia when it had sufficient money for the purpose and appealed to the members to reason with him. On his not staying in Funsi, the DCE said the geographical nature of th= e district posed a problem, pointing out that he had to be in Wa to be able t= o reach out to people in some communities that shared boundaries with Wa Municipality before going back to Funsi. "I enjoy staying in Funsi than Wa. I feel comfortable staying in Funsi than Wa and the people can be of testimony to this fact that I stay in Funsi.

"My human relations with the people in the district are also 100 per cent perfect, no doubt about that", he said.

About revenue mobilisation, Mr. Salifu said some of the assembly members were thwarting the efforts of the assembly in getting their people to pay levies, rates and other commitments to the assembly. "Some of the assembly members tell their people not pay tax, levies, and rates to the assembly and these are the very people who are agitating for the payment of ex-gratia due them".

Mr. Salifu said he would publish the list of names of students who the assembly was supporting in the payment of school fees to silence the detractors who were bent on destroying him.

Mr. Sumaila Ewuntomah, Wa East District Coordinating Director, told the assurance that they would be paid as soon as funds were available. He said about 30,000 Ghana cedis was provided to support students in higher institutions in 2009 but that the Assembly had been constrained last year because only the first and second quarter allocations of the District Assembly Common Fund had been received.

"We had budgeted for support for students last year but our inability t= o support the students had come about as a result of the delay in the payment of the Common Fund".