Western Region Chiefs tackle disputes

President of the Western Regional House of Chiefs, Ogyeahoho Yaw Gyebi II, has promised to do all within his power to bring to the barest minimum the number of chieftaincy disputes that have bedeviled the area.

The move, according to him, is aimed at ensuring accelerated development in the various traditional areas in the region.

He has also appealed to stakeholders in the region to join hands to improve education.

Speaking at the Kundum festival of the chiefs and people of Essikado, Ogyeahoho Gyebi remarked, “We need to explore avenues to improve the sciences, technical and vocational education as well as Information, Communication Technology (ICT) in our schools.”

This year’s festival was under the theme, “The role of tradition in the community and national development.”

Ogyeahoho Gyebi, who is also a board member of Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), told the gathering that the corporation created the ‘GNPC Foundation’ to apply a portion of the oil revenue to tackle the challenges facing the education sector.

He called for urgent steps to address the challenges and added that revenue from the oil and gas activities must benefit the people and improve education, especially in the Western Region.

“If we focus on oil related courses – science and mathematics – we will improve education and also ensure economic progress and prosperity.” he added.

He wondered why about £10,000 should be spent on people to go abroad each year, arguing that such a training could be done here with an improvement of petrochemical and mining engineering courses and laboratory facilities at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) and other universities.

This year, Ogyeahoho Gyebi indicated, about 400 students would benefit from the GNPC Foundation scholarships with about 150 beneficiaries selected from the region.

The Metropolitan Chief Executive for Sekondi-Takoradi, Anthony K.K. Sam, also lamented the decline of educational standards and appealed to parents to control the influence of television in the homes and the playing of snookers in the metropolis.