Krachi-East District Assembly to start food haulage venture

Dambai, Jan. 25, GNA- Krachi-East District Assembly, one of the newly created districts in the Volta Region, is discussing the possibility of acquiring a 10-tonne cargo truck to start a food haulage venture.

Mr James Moari, Acting District Coordinating Director, made this known on Monday when he addressed the First Ordinary Meeting of the District Assembly at Dambai.

Dambai, capital of the District, has a busy market where yam, cereal and fish wholesalers converge to do business.

Mr Moari said when business commenced the District Assembly would negotiate with the local Ghana Private Road Transport Union for special loading rights to cart goods for clients of the Assembly. Touching on revenue He said, the Assembly expected all the sub-district structures to collect data on all eligible tax payers to make the collection of the yearly 2,000 cedis development levies from people above 18 years more effective.

He said the Assembly would take over the payment of allowances for the staff of the three Area Councils to raise their morale.

Mr Moari said the 2.9-billion cedis administrative block of the Assembly would be completed this year alongside the renovation of the Volta River Authority residential facilities for staff of the Assembly. He said 10 semi-detached bungalows would be put up within the next three years.

Mr Moari said under education, 70 brilliant but needy children would be given scholarships while some teacher trainees would receive sponsorship.

The Assembly is also funding the establishment of an Experimental School for Dambai Training College while efforts are underway to solve the water problems facing the people with the support of the German Agency for Technical Cooperation.

The Assembly collected 74.6 million cedis within three months of its operations- October to December 2004, while the targeted internally generated revenue for 2005 stands at 670 million.

Expected outlays from the District Assembly Common fund are 9.1 billion cedis and 1.9 billion cedis from the HIPC Fund. Total revenue expectation including grants is about 11.8 billion cedis while total expenditure is about 11.7 billion cedis.