Rumor Mill of Friday, 28 November 2003
Source: Palaver
2003-11-28Ghana Palaver Intelligence
Is it true that ...
President Kufuor is now paid US$8,000 or about ?87 million all-inclusive per diem foreign travel allowance, and that part of this amount is paid into the foreign account of his brother, Defence Minister Dr. Kwame Addo-Kufuor, with the President claiming that that money is his personal money and not part of the NPP Campaign fund-raising resources?
Persons newly employed by the NPP Government in the Presidential Household at the State House and the Castle Annex who have worked between just 1? years and 2 years are being paid much higher rates of remuneration than their older and more experienced counterparts that they met at post from under the NDC administration who have worked for 11 years and above, that the salaries for the new staff range between ?1.2 million and ?1.8 million as against ?380,000 and ?522,000 for the older staff, and that although the salary vouchers are all prepared by the Controller and Accountant-General’s Department, they are kept separate and apart in order to prevent the older staff from realising what is happening.
A special BNI surveillance team including car burglars and lock pickers has been trailing Minority Leader Alban Bagbin, hoping to ‘steal’ documents they suspect he has in his possession on the official renovations to the President’s private residence as well as on the ministerial bungalows rehabilitation/renovation/refurbishment/refurnishing, Bagbin having ‘dragged’ the President and two of his Ministers to the CHRAJ over the matter; and that a similar surveillance team is trailing Joshua Alabi, Greater Accra Regional Chairman of the NDC and Campaign Coordinator of the Atta-Mills Campaign Team, largely on account of NDC Flagbearer Professor Atta-Mills’ recent very successful visit to the IPS where Joshua Alabi lectures, and the linkage that NPP intelligence has drawn between that visit and the subsequent student riots on that campus occasioned by the refusal and/or failure of the Legon Hospital authorities to treat a sick IPS student that allegedly resulted! in his death, besides also looking for other vital information that they think Mr. Joshua Alabi may have?
A BNI team sent to the Kotoka International Airport to cover the return of former President Rawlings nearly lost its video camera with which it was secretly filming the mammoth crowd that had gathered to meet the former President when irate NDC supporters from Nima snatched it away from the team, and that it took all the persuasive skills and diplomatic acumen of NDC General Secretary Dr. Nii Josiah Aryeh to get the camera returned to the team the next day after BNI goons had stormed the Headquarters of the NDC and threatened to pull down the building brick by brick like Samson did to the Temple of the Philistines if the camera was not produced within 24 hours?
Deputy Minister of Information Asamoah-Boateng’s recent regional and district whistle-stop tours to the Central, Ashanti and Brong Ahafo Regions was not really a working visit but a purely political visit with the following political objectives: (i) Planning electoral strategies with the Regional Ministers and the District Chief Executives;
(ii) Confirming to the chiefs letters already written to them by the Regional Coordinating Directors soliciting their support for the NPP in the 2004 elections;
Announcing the names and other details of the 30 newly created constituencies wrongfully communicated by the Electoral Commission to the NPP Government and claiming the credit for the NPP Government for creating those districts.
