body-container-line-1
28.10.2016 General News

Pandemonium breaks out at Assembly meeting …As members walk out in protest against gas cylinders hoarding

By Ghanaian Chronicle
Pandemonium breaks out at Assembly meeting As members walk out in protest against gas cylinders hoarding
28.10.2016 LISTEN

PANDEMONIUM broke out during the sitting of the first session of the Ahanta West District Assembly (AWDA) on Tuesday morning, when the elected members who form two-thirds of the Assembly walked out of the meeting, thus throwing the process into disorderliness.

The sitting, which was to approve the 2016/2017 budget for the Assembly was greeted with confusion, following the decision by the elected members to walk out of the meeting in strong protest against what they described as deliberate attempt on the part of management, particularly the District Chief executive (DCE) to go contrary to some arrangements in the House.

According to them, the DCE was deliberately hoarding 1000 pieces of gas cylinders and their accessories meant to be given to them (elected Assembly members) for onward distribution to their electorates.

The Assembly members said they became alarmed when after taking delivery of the gas cylinders on behalf of the Assembly, the DCE and his team refused to hand them over to them (elected Assembly members).

It is against this backdrop that they decided to throw the session to approve the 2016/2017 budget into disarray, until the gas cylinders had been distributed to them, the irate Assembly members noted.

Several attempts made to speak to the DCE yielded no result, as calls to his phone were not answered.

However, one of the elected Assembly members, Barnabas Yankey, who represents the Beahu electoral area confirmed to this reporter that the decision to walk out of the meeting was a deliberate one, orchestrated by the elected Assembly members to push for the gas cylinders to be released to them.

He said their action stems from the fact that they could not understand why they (Assembly members) have been registered and made to pay for the cost of the gas cylinders, yet the Assembly was still keeping them.

Narrating how the elected Assembly members were registered, Barnabas Yankey told this reporter that each Assembly member was made to register through their zonal areas with a specified amount of money.

He explained that each zonal area was to receive 100 gas cylinders based on the number of elected Assembly members making up the zonal area.

For instance, in the Apowa electoral zonal area, which has a total of nine elected Assembly members, 100 gas cylinders would be distributed to the Assembly members for onward distribution to their electorate.

Interestingly, after paying for the cost of the 100 gas cylinders, no word had come to them as to when exactly the items (gas cylinders) would be presented to them, even though they have been informed that other districts, including Shama, Sekondi-Takoradi, Ellembelle and Jomoro have already received their consignments.

Consequently, they decided to use the Assembly sitting to register their dissatisfaction over the decision of the Assembly to keep the items.

Information available to this reporter indicates that following the intensity of the noise that emanated from the disturbances at the Assembly, the DCE, Joseph Dofoyena had to step in to calm down tempers.

The DCE assured the Assembly members that he was going to make sure that they receive the gas cylinders next week Monday.

The assurance from the DCE eventually calmed tempers down resulting in the Assembly members return to continue the meeting.

The distribution of the gas cylinder, cook stoves and their accessories is the idea of the Ministry of Petroleum to discourage the use of fire wood for cooking by rural folks. It is under the Rural Promotion Programme.

Currently 60,000 cylinders, cook stoves and their accessories have been distributed since the prelaunch of the promotion programme.

From Alfred Adams, Takoradi.

body-container-line