Asante-Akim North holds public forum on fees

Konongo (Ash), Aug 29, GNA - As part of measures to involve the people in local governance, the Asante-Akim North District Assembly has organised a public forum to discuss the fixing of fees, rates and licences for the year 2007.

The forum, which has become part of the assembly's fee-fixing process in the last five years, was attended by representatives of civil society groups and other members of the public. The process, which is at its fourth stage, having gone through the budget, finance and administration as well as the executive committees, is expected to be adopted by the general assembly at its next sitting in September.

Mr George Kyei-Barfour, the Presiding Member, in his welcome address underscored the need to incorporate the people in the activities of the assembly to ensure transparency.

He called for a dispassionate deliberation in order to arrive at acceptable rates in the overall interest of the district. Mr Obeng Mireku, Chairman of the Finance and Administration Sub-Committee, in a presentation, said the assembly had received 2.6 billion cedis out of 6.9 billion cedis for the first half of the year as its share of the district assemblies' common fund. On internally generated funds, Mr Mireku disclosed that 46.76 per cent of a projected 1.5 billion cedis for the year had been realised after the end of the first half of the year. He was optimistic that the assembly would exceed its target by the end of the year since the first half of the year was considered the lean period.

Mr Mireku further noted that the assembly cut its expenditure down by 10 per cent as against the same period the previous year, adding that if the trend continued for the rest of the year the assembly's financial standings would improve significantly.

Mr George Frimpong, District Chief Executive, in a reaction to a question on the increasing spate of indiscriminate waste disposal, expressed grave concern about the situation and called on stakeholders to step up efforts to curb the social menace.

He said improper waste disposal continued to drain resources of the assembly and that 3.7 billion cedis was spent on the evacuation of refuse last year whilst 250 million cedis had so far been spent on waste management this year.

Participants approved majority of the proposed rates with only a few being rejected.