Mrs Evelyn Ama Kumi-Richardson, Bono Regional Minister
Mrs Evelyn Ama Kumi-Richardson, Bono Regional Minister

Execute responsibilities devoid of partisan politics

Local government workers have been charged to execute their responsibilities devoid of partisan politics since they are not politicians.

According to the Bono Regional Minister, Mrs Evelyn Ama Kumi-Richardson it was not right for local government workers  to sabotage policies and programmes of the government of the day but rather support it to achieve such policies and programmes.

Addressing staff of the Wenchi Municipal Assembly as part of her familiarisation tour of the region, Mrs Kumi-Richardson said as implementors of government’s policies and programmes it was important for them to shelve their political affiliation and support the government to execute its ideas, policies and programmes for the development of the country.

"Local government workers are not politicians, so I entreat you to execute your responsibilities devoid of partisan politics", she stated.

Tree Crop Development Board

Responding to an appeal by the Queenmother of the Wenchi Traditional Area, Nana Atoa Sramangyedua, the Deputy Bono Regional Minister, Mr Siaka Stevens who accompanied the minister on her tour restated government’s commitment to establish the Tree Crop Development Board to regulate activities of tree crops such as coconut, shea nut, cashew nut and palm nut trees in the country.

“Even though the government assured Ghanaians, especially cashew growing districts of the establishment of a cashew development board, but the President realised that cash crops such as coconut, shea nut and oil palm needed to be considered and thus put them together under one board”’ he explained.

Nana Sramangyedua also expressed concern about the rather low producer price of raw cashew nuts explaining that its price had slumped from GH¢1,000 per 100 kilogramme in 2018 to GH¢100 in 2019 and appealed to the government to set a regulatory body to ensure the proper management of the industry.   

Upgrading

She again called on the government to consider transforming the Wenchi Farm Institute into a University of Agriculture to train different field experts in agriculture.
According to her, the poor state of the institute called for swift measures to save it from collapsing.

Nana Sramangyedua also called on the government to revamp the Wenchi Tomacan Factory, which had been shut down for years, for the processing of raw tomatoes and cashew, explaining that raw tomatoes and cashew nuts were going waste due to the absence of these factories in the area.

She said the youth in the area had lost their jobs as a result of the shutdown of the Wenchi Tomacan Factory and appealed to the government to  institute measures for the reopening of the factory.

Assurance

Mr Stevens gave the assurance that when Parliament resumed, it would consider the bill to establish the tree crop development board and encouraged farmers who were into the production of such crops not to lose hope since plans were advanced in the establishment of a board.

He explained that the board would help to determine the price of the commodities and the prospective buyers among others.   

Chieftaincy disputes

At Odumase in the Sunyani West District, Mrs Kumi-Richardson addressed chiefs and staff of the Sunyani West District Assembly and called on the Bono Regional House of Chiefs to work hard to solve the nine  disputes pending before the house.

She said the government was ready to provide logistics and security to help the house address the nine outstanding chieftaincy cases  since peace was a requisite to development and pledged  the government’s support to the various traditional authorities .

The minister and her deputy also interacted with the staff of the Sunyani Municipal Assembly and inspected various projects embarked upon by the various Municipal and District Assemblies (MDAs).

The Queen mother of Odumase Number 1, Nana Abena Boatemaa II appealed to the regional minister to ensure that the Kwatire Polyclinic was upgraded to a district hospital for quality health delivery.

She also called on the minister to lobby for the upgrade of the Sunyani West District Assembly to a municipal status to promote development.

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