The Adansi Traditional Council has given the Ministry of Finance a two-week ultimatum to pay the council its share of royalties or face court action.
The acting President of the council and Edubiasehene, Nana Assiama Guahyia Ababio said at a press conference at Fomena at the weekend that the council has resolved to seek an order of mandamus to compel the ministry to pay up, if the money is not paid within two weeks.
The threat from the chiefs has been precipitated by the refusal of the ministry to release their share of the mineral royalties in spite of the instructions given by the President, following several petitions and personal calls to him by the chiefs.
He argued that although it is on record that the Ashanti Goldfields has been paying promptly and sometimes on monthly basis, the government has not paid anything to them for the period October, 2000 to June, this year.
“The point here is that the share of the royalties due to Adansi is not a charge on the normal funds of the government but a remittance from the AGC Ltd, just in the same way as timber royalties due to stools are not part of the normal revenue coming under the Appropriation Law.”
Nana Guahyia Ababio explained that in spite of the Constitutional provisions that only 10 per cent of the total royalties collected by the Office of the Administrator of Stool Lands shall be kept by the Administrator for administrative expenses, the government keeps as much as 80 per cent of the royalties and still charges another 10 per cent for so-called Mineral Development Fund and wondered why the government does not use part of the 80 per cent for that purpose?”
“The 10 per cent which comes to Adansi for sharing in accordance with the District Assemblies and the Office of the Administrator of Stool Lands regulations has still not been released since October 2000,” he said.
Throwing more light on the disbursement of the 10-per cent shares, the Edubiasehene said the district assemblies receive 55 per cent out of the 10 per cent for administrative purposes.
In effect stools and traditional councils receive 25 per cent and 20 per cent out of the remaining nine per cent respectively.
Nana Guahyia said that “the office of the Administrator of Stool Lands receive one per cent, the District Assemblies 4.95 per cent, the stools 2.05 per cent and the traditional authorities only two per cent which should not be so under the existing constitutional provisions.
He said the royalties are meant for the maintenance of the stools but the undue delay had caused projects initiated in their various communities, including scholarships awarded to brilliant needy students, to be discontinued.
The acting president expressed regret that the chiefs have to raise loans and bank overdrafts to meet some of their legitimate customary commitments.
The Edubiasehene called for the abolition of the payment of their share of the royalties into the Consolidated Fund, asking that it should be paid to the administrator of stool lands. - Daily Graphic
