Minister’s daughter now "deputy minister"

The Upper West Regional Minister Moctar Sahannun might take instructions from the President down-south Accra; but up-north Wa, the Regional Capital of that region, Minister Sahannun’s role surpasses that of his boss.

It is a perfect enactment of exercising ultra vires powers. There is information available to The Independent which speak of Sahannum issuing government vehicles to his daughter and the Upper West Chairman of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) without course to laid down procedures.

Officially, the Upper West Region is one of the two Regions with no deputy Minister, but at Wa, the regional capital, the big joke is that Attia Sahannun, the daughter of Regional Minister Sahannun Moctar is “the unofficial deputy minister” for that region.

Based on the father’s instructions, Attia Mugtarri, currently unemployed uses the official Four Wheel Drive vehicle allotted to the office of the deputy Minister of that region.

The last public officer to use the said vehicle, The Independent discovered was Bin Zendeng, the former Upper West Regional Minister in the NDC regime.

Sahannun would not stop there as we gathered, he also ordered the Regional Co-ordinating Director, Nyan Kamawu to release his official white Toyota Pick Up with registration number-GR 714 R to the Upper West Regional Chairman of the NPP for party activities.

The car, which was last cited at Bole by this reporter, is currently in Accra. Mr. Nyankamawu confirmed this when contacted on phone last Friday that indeed the Minister asked him to release the referenced vehicle.

He was not privy however to the whereabouts of the vehicle, and said he currently uses a Pajero Four Wheel drive. Regional Minister Sahannum also told The Independent on the phone that the security operations in the area necessitated the release of the vehicle from the Co-ordinating Director to be added to the Upper West security detail.

On the issue of her daughter using the deputy Minister’s vehicle, the Regional Minister rhetorically asked “If my car has broken down, is it wrong to use the said car to, for instance, take my wife to the market”.

A former typist at the Lawra District Assembly, Attia now enjoys all the trappings that go with the office of deputy Regional Minister of the Upper West Region, The Independent investigations have confirmed.

An official driver employed by the state chauffeurs her in all her rounds in the town and beyond with detailed security personnel according her the requisite honours. “You dare not refuse to salute her if she is cozily being wheeled around the Wa township in the official Four Wheel Drive”, a constable who for obvious reasons we cannot disclose his identity told this reporter.

What is more intriguing, the Constable said, is the fact that the said vehicle is fuelled by the state with payment of maintenance and repair works borne by the state.

Other residents who The Independent spoke to were shocked at the behaviour of the Regional Minister who during his tenure as the Upper West Regional Secretary of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) assumed an unofficial position as the conscience of that region.

According to them, he was the foremost critic of the NDC government lashing at the manner government functionaries in the region use state funds to repair their private cars.

“He also bemoaned the practice where state officials change cars whilst people cannot even get three square meals a day”, a resident disclosed.

During the campaign period, Attia Dogo said, Minister Moctar made these issues assume a national dimension and wondered whether in the midst of such display of insensitivity, abuse of office and flagrant display of opulence by government officials, they should be forgiven by the Wa people as their hospitals, roads and other infrastructure in the region remain unrepaired and neglected.