Vice President inspects dam project

... attends NPP rally in Kassena-Nankana

Vice President Aliu Mahama at the weekend said it is Government's plan to promote all-year-round farming in the northern part of the country through the provision of dams and dugouts.

This, he said, would reduce rural poverty in addition to generating jobs that would prevent the youth from migrating down south.

The Vice President made the statement when he inspected work on a 580-million-cedi dam being constructed for the people of Akudugu-Dabo in the Kassena-Nankana district of the Upper East Region.

The dam, which is being constructed by the Irrigation Company of Upper Region (ICOUR), will serve about 100 farm families when completed in about three months' time.

The Vice President observed that water is central in every aspect of the lives of the people in the Upper East. "You use water to raise you livestock, to cultivate rice, dry-season farming as well as for domestic purposes" he said.

He added that it was in regard that government had had committed itself to the rehabilitation of existing dams and the provision of new ones in various parts of the region for the benefit of the people.

The Vice President also visited a number of communities within the Kassena-Nankana area to interact with the chiefs and people and to acquaint himself with their problems.

These include Dorba, Nayagnia, Mayoro, Gani, Vonania, Kapania and Janania. Central in the theme of his message to the residents was the need to give their children good secular education, as it was the only way to fight poverty.

He also expressed his condolences to the chiefs and people for the death of the late John Achuliwor, Member of Parliament of the area.

Vice President Aliu later addressed an NPP rally in Navrongo town, where he introduced Mr Joseph Kofi Adda, the Party's candidate for the Navrongo Central Constituency by-election to the electorate.

He urged the people of Navrongo to cast their votes for Mr Adda on March 25, so he could continue with the development projects their late MP had begun.

Professor Christopher Ameyaw Akumfi, Minister of Education, Hajia Alima Mahama, Deputy Minister of Local Government and Rural Development, Dr G.A. Agambilla, Deputy Minster of Finance, Mr Clement Eledi, Deputy Minister of Mines, Mr Boniface Abubakari Sidique, Deputy Minister of Trade and Mr Dominic Netiwul, MP for Bimbilla, all took turns to address the rally, citing various reasons why the people of Navrongo should return an NPP candidate to Parliament.