The first ordinary meeting of the Tano South District Assembly has been held at the Bechem the District Capital.
In an opening address, the Presiding Member of the Assembly Hon. Anthony Opoku warmly welcomed all to the meeting and commended them for their prompt and massive turn out for this important meeting. He pleaded for the attention and cooperation of all during proceedings and again intimated the need for Hon. Members to pay maximum attention, cooperation and tolerance during deliberations to ensure a successful meeting.
Hon. Anthony Opoku re-echoed the need for members including our distinguished heads of Departments and agencies present at the meeting who wish to contribute to discussions offer explanation or seek clarification on any issue to raise their hands and patiently wait until he or she caches the eye of the Hon. Presiding member and cautioned Hon. Members to avoid reading any other material that has no relevance to the business of the house.
On revenue mobilisation, Hon. Opoku suggested the need for the Assembly to detail an officers who will go round all town/ area councils to compile the list of rateable properties to enhance revenue mobilization and again suggested that Hon. Members should join hands with the revenue supervisions as a matter of urgency on a campaign to educate the general public particularly about the rates chargeable by the assembly on each item after the fee fixing resolution has been approved.
Hon. Anthony Opoku made a special appeal to the assembly to mitiate the best teacher award in the Tano South District and suggested the assembly to urge the District Directorate of Ghana Education Service to work and come out with a full formula for the selection of best teachers to be awarded. Hon. Opoku informed the house that the assembly had taken delivery of its allocation of the motor bikes and entreated members to hold their breath patiently for the Hon. District Chief Executive to throw more light on the modalities, procedure and the way forward that we shall adopt regarding the release of the motor bikes to Hon. Assembly members, and appealed to assembly members to always brief their electorates about deliberations that transpire in the house since without this and other consultations, Governments concept of participatory governance and decentralization would be meaningless.
The Tano South District Chief Executive Hon. Bukari Zakari Anaba in his sectional address welcomed all present at the meeting and said it is indeed essential and appropriate for us as a District Assembly and of course a body statutorily responsible for the overall development of the District here to constantly meet to discuss and deliberate on issues pertaining to the development and well being of the very people we are representing.
The District Chief Executive told the honourable members that the meeting like any other meeting is to enable them plan, execute and evaluate their performance and also to make it possible for them to adequately prepare and equip themselves in meeting the challenges ahead as representatives of the people of the District.
Hon. Anaba informed the house that the 2012 Functional Organizational Assessment Tool (FOAT) exercise on the District Assembly’s performance successfully took place in January, 2012 and a provisional result of the exercise indicates that the District Assembly has once again qualified to benefit from the District Development Fund and commended the efforts of the staff of the District Assembly in particular and those of the Decentralized Departments and agencies in general whose efforts made it possible for us to reach this far. Hon. Anaba said the assembly’s revenue performance in the past has not been the best and that we all have a stake in reversing the trend. He said the advice slip of an amount of GH₵ 429,000.00 being the districts allocation of the DDF has been received and projects emarked for funding under the DDF are in procurement and on-going.
On community water and sanitation Hon. Anaba said the NDC Government is committed to ensuring that the good people of this country are provided with adequate portable water and also the government believes that provision of good drinking water will drastically reduce the infection incidence rate of most of the water born preventable diseases that affect the people and informed the house that ten (10) boreholes fixed with hand pumps have been provided by GOG/AFD peri-urban, Rural and Small Town water and sanitation project (PRSTWP) in ten communities in the Tano South District again said the Hon. Deputy Minister for water Resources Work and Housing ,Hon. Dr. Hanna Louisa Bisiw an illustrious daughter of the District also lobbied for the funding and construction of 27 boreholes in 27 communities in the District and called on members to let them appreciate her effort for being a strong advocate of development projects for the District.
Hon. Anaba touched on security and said the District has been relatively calm and peaceful except for in few isolated cases. He said DISEC and the District security agencies were however able to manage those situations and also maintained the existence law and order that allowed residence to go about their daily activities unperturbed.
On the looming land dispute between Brosankro and Tepa at Ouwe Nkwanta Hon. Anaba said the problem continue to linger on for now and the security aspect of the matter is before the Ashanti and Brong Ahafo Regional security council’s (REGSECs) while His Majesty, the Asantehene, Otumfuor Osei Tutu ll handles the traditional aspect and hope to arrive at consensus and amicable settlement of the dispute and used the occasion to appesl to all honourable members and the people of the District to desist from making utterances and comments that will escalate the dispute as people of the two traditional area are one and the same people and what unites us are more that what should divide us.
Hon. Anaba informed the house that the establishment of a District Fire Service unit and station in the District is now complete and again informed the house that there were a number of fire outbreaks which destroyed some properties but said, the good news is that no life was affected. He said the recent rainstorm hit some communities in the District and succeeded in destroying some public schools, private houses farms and other public and private properties. He again said, the Assembly is making frantic efforts to rehabilitate structures which were affected at the St. Joseph College of Education during the rainstorm.
The District Chief Executive mentioned some social development programmes embarked on by the government and their impact on the people of the District. He said the school feeding programme is on course and is successfully being implemented in eleven (11) selected schools in the District. He said the implementation of the programme has resulted in the improvement of total enrolment figures in all the beneficiary school and hoped more schools in the District will be added to the list that was previously 5 and now increased to 11.
The National Youth Employment Programme in the District, the District Chief Executive said was on course and contributing greatly to the National Production and development effort. The District Chief Executive told the house that the National Identification Authority during their 10 days registration exercise in the Tano South District registered 38,139 people and used the opportunity to thank all stakeholders, particularly Hon. Assembly Members for their support and cooperation for the success of the exercise.
Hon. Anaba informed members the Assembly has taken delivery of 53 out of the expected 57 motor bikes for distribution to Assembly members and promised efforts are been made to take delivery of the remaining 4 and said a modality is been work out for distribution. He informed the house that the Assembly has registered all the bikes in the name of beneficiary members at the DVLA and pleaded with those who would not be getting the bikes to exercise maximum restraint while we wait for the receipt of the remaining four (4) motor bikes from NALAG.
On the ongoing Biometric Voters Registration Hon. Anaba said a registration term is expected to spend only 10 days in each registration centre and rest on the 11th day and then continue. He said registration starts at 7:00am and end at 6:00pm each registration day from Sunday to Saturday and urge all Assembly members to take note of the arrangement and educate the electorates accordingly whilst he stressed that they should let the people know the difference between the National Identification Registration and the Electoral commissions Biometric Registration Exercise.
The District Chief Executive hinted that this year is an election year and it therefore behoves on us to be wary of the sort and content of news, information and campaign messages that we receive from various Political Parties. he said what is required of us is to critically examine the contents of these campaign message and information so as to embrace those that will unite and support the progress and development as one people one nation with a common history and destiny. He advised that we should be quick to reject campaign messages and information that are likely to create division, rancho and factionalism.
The Tano South District Director of the NCCE Ms. Cynthia Anima Boadu used the occasion to brief the house on the ongoing Biometric Registration Exercise and answered questions on them from members of the house.
ASSEMBLY MEMBERS RECEIVE MOTORBIKES
Fifty three (53) out of a total membership of fifty seven (57) members of the Tano South District Assembly received a motor bike each at a short but impressive presentation ceremony held at Bechem after the Assembly’s first ordinary General Assembly Meeting.
In a short speech the District Chief Executive Hon. Bukari Zakari Anaba said the presentation was in fulfilment of the Governments pledge to supply each assembly member in the country with a motor bike
to enhance their movement and productivity. He pleaded with them to adhere to the culture of mentiance so as to prolong the life span of the bike.
Hon. Nana Fosu Darkwa an assembly member thanked the government and the Tano South District Assembly for the gesture and promised the bikes would be used for the purpose of which it was brought.
