The Dean of the 26 Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies in the Northern Region, Mohammed Hashim Abdallah says the Regional Coordinating Council(RCC) will investigate how a purported circular requesting the MMDAs to pay GHC 5,000 each in preparation for President Nana Akufo Addo’s visit up-north this week was made public.

“We’ll have to investigate thoroughly how come such a confidential administrative letter is in public domain. We want to know which of our offices this letter sneaked out,” he told Accra-based Citi FM.

The President is expected up north of the country for a 3-day tour of the region from 6th-8th October 2017.

A letter issued by the Northern Regional Coordinating Director, Alhassan Issahaku addressed to Metropolitan, Municipal and District Chief Executives and sighted by Kasapafmonline.com, said “In the bid to put together the required arrangement for a successful tour, each assembly is required to contribute an amount of Five Thousand Ghana Cedis (GHC5,000) payable by Monday 2nd October, 2017.”

There was brouhaha over the internal memo after it was leaked to the media on Sunday, following concerns that the this expenditure will affect the budgetary plan of most Assemblies, especially those that do not have the financial muscle to undertake such activities.

But the RCC has since explained that the amount quoted in that circular is to serve as a cap for the MMDAs not to overspend the budget on the upcoming event.