Bosomtwe-Atwima-Kwanwoma Assembly fails to elect Presiding Member

Kuntanase (Ash), Feb. 12, GNA - For the second time running the Bosomtwe-Atwima-Kwanwoma District Assembly in the Ashanti Region failed to elect a Presiding Member (PM) after three rounds of voting on Friday. In December last year, the Assembly could not elect the PM after two rounds of voting even though Mr Joseph Kwasi Assuming, the incumbent PM was in the lead, the election had to end abruptly due to the violent behaviour of some Assembly members.

At Friday's voting, conducted by officials of the Electoral Commission, Mr Assuming polled 38 votes at the first round as against 21 votes polled by Professor Peter Gyau.

During the second and third rounds of voting, Mr Assuming had 39 votes while Professor Gyau had 22 votes and this forced Mr Joseph Ofori Prempeh, the District Electoral Officer to defer the election for a new date to be fixed as none of the contestants got the two-third majority. Mr Bright Addai-Mununkum, the acting District Chief Executive, speaking after the postponement of the election, said the Assembly would this year vote a large chunk of funds towards education to strengthen the human resource base of the District.

He said the construction of a six-classroom block at Mpatasie, a community clinic at Sawua and a 12-seater aqua privy toilet, all costing 750 million cedis from the HIPC funds would soon commence to help improve upon the standard of living of the people. The DCE urged the Assembly members to educate their people on the need to join the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) to enable them to get quality health care.