Shai Osudoku MP chases DCE for common fund

Member of Parliament (MP) for the Shai Osudoku Constituency in the Greater Accra Region, Linda Obenewaa Akweley Ocloo, is at loggerheads with the District Chief Executive (DCE) for the area, Daniel Teye Akuffo over purported delays in releasing about GH?200,000 being outstanding payment of her share of the 2020 MPs’ Common Fund.

The amount is part of what she describes as her second, third and fourth quarter payments released to the Assemblies by the District Assemblies Common Fund Administrator for projects to be directed by the legislators.

The Shai Osudoku National Democratic Congress (NDC) Legislator who is worried about the development is determined to square-off with the Assembly Chief to claim what she says rightly belongs to her.

Speaking in an interview, Linda Akweley who has just begun her second term in parliament said Mr. Akuffo used personal scores during the last electioneering campaign to deny her the Common Fund.

The MP said her office needed the money to among other things, express her appreciation to her constituents for the love and support shown her in the run-up to the 2020 general elections.

“The people of Shai Osudoku have done really well, looking at the huge investments from the NPP, they brought a lot of things to our constituents, I mean irrespective of that they voted for NDC so I want to reward them by buying these sachets of rice to give to everyone to say a very big thank you to the people of Shai Osudoku which I went to my DCE, confronted him but he told me during the campaigning I said a lot of things about him so he would not grant my request. I said it's elections, you also said a lot of things about me that were not true. In every election an MP should be resourced irrespective of your party affiliation, I mean we have to develop the constituency,” said the Member of Parliament.

Suspecting that the refusal was borne out of calculated sabotage by the NPP government against NDC MPs, the MP averred that her common fund was still denied her despite the elections being over.

“After the elections, he refused to approve all the requests I sent. I said okay if it has to do with the elections, and you know these NPP people, they are unpredictable, perhaps they’ve been told that they shouldn’t grant any NDC MP any popularity in terms of giving out the common fund to do something that would protect us,” said Linda Ocloo.

The legislator accused Mr. Akuffo of using personal scores to deny her legitimate entitlements, adding that all pronouncements made by her against the DCE during the electioneering campaign were true nevertheless.

She wondered why the DCE and the District Assembly could not utilise the massive revenue raked in especially from the tens of quarries in the district.

“In a nutshell what I said was true because we Shai Osudoku, I mean when we talk about quarries, we have a lot of quarries. Shai hills alone, we have 45 quarries and weekly sales of GH?32,000 [from each quarry] so if we have all this and the DCE cannot use [it] to improve our road infrastructure, just approve my own common fund, he refused but this time, I’m going to march them boot for boot. My common fund is not for the DCE, he doesn’t have any right to prevent me from accessing my own common fund,” she fumed.

Though she could not state emphatically how much of her Fund remains outstanding, she estimated it could amount to between GH?150,000 and GH?200,000.

“The amount, I can’t [state emphatically how much] but it’s huge, if I’ll not lie, it’ll pass Gh200000, between the range of GH?150000 and GH?200000,” she said.

Linda Ocloo dismissed claims of poor performance against her during her first tenure as MP while questioning the 95% allocation of the common fund to MMDCEs while MPs are given a paltry 4.5%.

DCE’s response

But denying the accusations, Mr. Daniel Teye Akuffo cataloged payments he said had been made to the MP from 2019 to 2020.

“For the 3rd quarter of 2019, she received GH?78,534, the 4th quarter of 2019, she received GH?110,000 thereabout. For the 1st quarter of 2020, she received Gh?65,410.58 for 2nd quarter of 2020, she received GH?67,000 plus,” he disclosed.

He added that as at the last check, there’s an unpresented check of Gh?3,613 in the account of the MP bringing the balance in her account to about GH?35,000.

The Assembly Chief also went ahead to list the expenditures paid by the Assembly for the MP between May and October 2020 including costs of public information systems, items for the aged, sports equipment, tricycles, and rice amounting to GH?286,716 out of a received sum of GH?321,412.27 and an opening account of GH?993.46 totaling GH?322,405.73.

Mr. Akuffo denied allegations of sabotage against the MP, adding that though she submitted some requests in December, only parts were met as her account balance could not meet all the demands.

“She brought a request for payment for two purchases; rice, one is GH?18,000, another is GH?46,000. We processed the GH?18,000 and when you process the GH?18000 [out of the GH?35000] the balance will be Gh17,688. Meanwhile, the second request is GH?46,000 so it means that the balance cannot even meet the second request,” he explained.

He, therefore, advised the Member of Parliament to feel free to go to the finance department of the Assembly to make the necessary inquiries.

The District Assemblies’ Common Fund (DACF) is a pool of resources created under Article 252 of the 1992 constitution of Ghana.

It is a minimum of 7.5% of the national revenue set aside to be shared among all District Assemblies in Ghana with a formula approved by Parliament.

The fund is a Development Fund which enables the use of the nation’s wealth throughout Ghana to the benefit of all citizens.

Part of the Fund is disbursed directly to District Assemblies in accordance with the approved Formula. This is referred to as ‘direct transfers.

The MMDAs use the funds for projects and programmes determined by their respective Assemblies.

Also, about four percent of the Fund is shared to Members of Parliament for constituency project, one and a half percent is shared among the 10 Regional Co-ordinating Councils for the supervision of the Assemblies in their respective Regions while two percent is reserved to meet contingency expenditures.