President Mahama directs Minister to review allowances of chiefs

President John Dramani Mahama has directed the Minister for Chieftaincy and Culture Affairs to review the allowances of chiefs and submit proposals to government for immediate action.

The President has also authorized the Ministry of Chieftaincy and Culture Affairs and Attorney General’s Department to work out modalities that would facilitate efforts aimed at ensuring that paramount chiefs and Queenmothers effectively work together.

President Mahama, National Democratic Congress presidential candidate for Election 2012, gave this directive when he addressed a special meeting of the National House of Chiefs at Kumasi.

The meeting attracted leaderships of various regional Houses of chiefs and Queenmothers from selected paramountcies of the country.

President Mahama said he was aware of challenges of chieftaincy, and that his administration would work hard to provide the necessary legal, infrastructural and logistical support for the institution.

The President said government had procured 12 vehicles for distribution to all the Regional Houses of Chiefs and the National House of Chiefs.

He also promised that government would complete all abandoned and uncompleted offices of the various Houses of Chiefs to facilitate their work.

President Mahama appealed to chiefs advocating the location of district capitals in their traditional area to exercise restraint since political demarcations were not conterminous with various traditional areas of the country.

President Mahama promised to support chiefs to institute effective Alternative Dispute Resolution to complement efforts of other judicial systems in the country.

Naa Professor John Nabila, President of the National House of Chiefs, appealed to government to review the inadequate allowance for chiefs at all levels.

He requested that such allowance should include linguists and other sub or divisional traditional authorities, who help chiefs to carry out their duties.