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Koforidua, May 20, GNA - The Eastern Regional Minister, Mr Samuel Ofosu-Ampofo, has appealed to District and Municipal Chiefs Executives and District Directors of Education not to award contract for sewing of free school uniforms to tailors and dress makers in the big towns alone.

He said the uniforms should be sent to tailors and dress makers in=

the communities where they would be distributed so that people in those communities could also share in the economic benefits of the project. Mr Ofosu-Ampofo said this when he distributed 42, 000 school uniforms to Municipal and District Chief Executives and their District Directors of Education under the government free school uniform programme= at Koforidua on Tuesday.

He also gave out over 1,230,000 exercise books to the District Directors of Education. Mr Ofosu-Ampofo presented 21 motor bicycles to the District Environmental Officers in the 21 District and Municipal Assemblies in the=

Region. He gave out additional 12 motor cycles to 12 Municipal and District Assemblies to be used to monitor the Block Farm, Youth in Agriculture and=

the Youth in Forestation programmes.

Mr Ofosu-Ampofo urged the District and Municipal Chief Executives to pre-finance the sewing of the school uniforms so that they could later present their bill for reimbursement.

Mr Ofosu-Ampofo advised the District and Municipal Chief Executives= to ensure that nobody pays any money for the school uniforms and the exercis= e books and if they had any thought that a charge would be passed on to the=

end users, they should use their means to distribute the items. He said he had received reports that some people had started selling=

the exercise books and said he would set up a team to go round to monitor=

what is going on in the districts. The regional minister said the region would set up a committee to coll= ect data on the cleanest districts in the region and at the end of the year, they would be awarded prizes.