Kpone-Katamanso District Assembly looses revenue

The Kpone-Katamanso District Assembly, between January and July, lost GH¢129, 400 in revenue due to a boundary dispute between the Assembly and the Tema Metropolitan Assembly (TMA).

Alhaji Antaiye Tetteh, the District Chief Executive, said “as many as 26 companies along that corridor have not discharged their tax obligations to this Assembly due to the dispute”. He said this on Tuesday in address during the second ordinary meeting of the second session of the first assembly.

Alhaji Tetteh said the dispute led to the Assembly mobilizing GH¢ 691,918.34 Internally Generated Fund (IGF) during the period, representing 42 percent of the annual estimate of GH¢1,647,700.00.

“Without the dispute, the Assembly would have collected GH¢ 129,400.00 from these 26 companies which would have raised our performance to 50 percent,” he said. Alhaji Tetteh said the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development had assured the Assembly of steps being taken to settle the dispute.

He said the chunk of the Assembly’s IGF went into recurrent expenditure, which left his outfit with virtually nothing for physical projects mentioning some of them as payment of allowances for staff and Assembly Members, purchase of office consumables and payment of salaries to IGF staff.

Alhaji Tetteh added that the staff strength of the Assembly had grown from 64 to 131 on Government of Ghana payroll and 40 to 86 on IGF payroll. He said the Assembly had plans to build schools, a district hospital and markets and appealed to the Kpone Traditional Council to release some land for these projects.

Mr Joseph Nii Laryea Afotey Agbo, Member of Parliament for the Kpone-Katamanso, expressed his happiness for the creation of the district. Mr Agbo, who is also the Volta Regional Minister, gave the assurance that he would liaise with other ministers to bring development project to the district.

The MP urged the traditional leaders of Appolonia as well as the Assembly to ensure that sand winning activities in their area was immediately halted. He said due to sand winning activities, Appolonia lands and Katamanso lands had become depleted and could not be used for agriculture.