Seth J. Bokpe's Ghana Newsreel

            Dr Kwadwo Afari-Gyan - EC Chairman The Electoral Commission is under fire to register some rejected presidential hopefuls or face court action. While the New Vision Party (NVP) is going to court to ensure that some EC officials involved in an alleged bribery scandal are investigated, the Independent People’s Party (IPP) has already gone to court to compel the EC to register its candidate, Mr Kofi Akpalu, with the National Democratic Party (NDP) giving the EC a 24-hour ultimatum to respond to questions concerning the disqualification of its flag bearer, Nana Konadu Agyeman Rawlings, or face legal action. Prophet Daniel Nkansah, the disappointed flag bearer of the NVP, told graphic.com.gh that he had a writ of summons to compel the EC to stop the election. According to him, the officials conducting the ...

THE question on the lips of many supporters of the National Democratic Congress is whether the party can survive the latest move by the Rawlingses for the spirit   and soul of the party. The former president defied convention last Saturday by not only attending the National Delegates Congress of the NDC-breakaway party, the National Democratic Party (NDP), but also endorsing its presidential candidate who happened to be his better half, Nana Konadu Agyeman Rawlings. Before then, the former President shocked many political commentators when he opened his doors to the leader of the opposition, New Patriotic Party. Those two events have political undertones that have tickled many NDC sympathisers on the wrong side. Although, the Nana Akufo-Addo visit is a recommendable act which should send signals to sympathisers of the respective parties that politics is a game of ideas, its timing is not sitting well with some party sympathisers. Like a bee, the two incidents hav...

THE German government is pumping 130 million Euros in bilateral commitments to the Ghanaian economy over the next three years. With the arrangement, Ghana is expected to receive 43 million Euros per year from 2012 to 2014 in support of private and financial sector development, decentralisation and agriculture. The funding would also be used to cater for budgetary support, good financial governance and the provision of renewable energy. While 55 million euros would go into budgetary support and good financial governance, 26.5 million euros is for private sector development;  24.6 million euros for decentralisation; 12.5 million euros for renewable energies; 9.4 million euros for agriculture and 200,000 euros for other areas. The Country Director of the GIZ, Mr Siegfried Leffler, announced the package at a German Trained Returned Entrepreneurship Training Seminar at Kumasi in the Ashanti Region. The German-Trained returned experts programme gives participants the opportunity to...

 After months of canvassing and sorting out its official documentation with the Electoral Commission, the National Democratic Party (NDP) is wrapping up its preparations for its National Delegates Congress scheduled for Kumasi on Saturday. Barring an unforeseen intervention, the Baba Yara Stadium in the Ashanti regional capital will be enveloped in the green, black and red colours of the NDP. While speculations continue to build as to whether former President J.J. Rawlings will throw his weight behind the NDP, that possibility appears to be on the horizon. However, sources told the Daily Graphic that former President J.J. Rawlings will be the special guest of honour at the event. This has been collaborated by a full page coloured advert which appeared in the Daily Graphic confirming that Flt J.J. Rawlings will be the special guest of honour. Unlike the convention where aspirants for a party’s presidential ticket are well known ahead of the congress, the NDP’s presidenti...

IT probably took about 45 seconds. Panic struck as the articulated cargo truck in front of him drove into the bush. His heart raced to his sleeves as he tried to manoeuvre his way from the speeding Yutong bus heading towards him. Then boooooooooooom! It happened. Seconds later, his body flew out of the car and everything else was darkness… Samuel Kwaku Konadu had no idea that day was going to be his last day on earth. The late 42-year-old driver of the Graphic Communications Group Limited (GCGL) left Accra on Friday night dressed in the company’s shirt for the fun games scheduled for the next day. His colleagues recall that he even had his soccer boots by his side. He had pledged to be part of the five-aside soccer game the next day to display the skills he had confined behind the wheels. But that was not to be. According to an eye witness account, the driver of the cargo truck which was in front of the Graphic vehicle had to swerve to avoid the on-coming Yutong which was spe...

The most crucial component of a car, the battery, which gets it moving, is often ignored or overlooked. This can prove to be costly and troublesome on the road. Do not take a car’s battery for granted. The battery in a car cranks the engine when the key is turned in the ignition. So, no matter how well the car is maintained, if the battery is not treated correctly, the car will not get on the road. Taking care of the battery is simple, easy and inexpensive. Read the following tips to keep the battery in your car always ready to crank. Maintaining a battery and monitoring the health of the battery will ensure that there will never come a situation when the car will not start at the traffic lights and cause you embarrassment; or worse get you stuck in the middle of nowhere, where help is not at hand. Never ignore the importance of maintaining a car’s battery as it will cost more to buy a new battery rather than maintaining an old one. * Turn off electric devices in the car. Take the ...

THREE presidential hopefuls in the 2012 race have expressed deep commitment to empowering the youth economically to create jobs. Presidential aspirants of the Progressive People’s Party (PPP), Dr Papa Kwesi Nduom; the Peoples National Convention (PNC), Mr Hassan Ayariga and an independent contender, Mr Jacob Osei-Yeboah, all acknowledged that the development of the Ghanaian youth could improve the country’s fortunes. The three aspiring presidential candidates were speaking at the 2012 Youth Presidential Dialogue organised by the Africa Youth Network. It was a platform given to all the presidential aspirants for the 2012 polls to engage the youth on their policies and programmes. Only the three aspirants turned up for the event which also attracted a sparse audience at the national theatre. When he took the podium with chants of “Edwuma wura,” to wit “employer”, a smiling Dr Nduom told the youth he had a track record of creating jobs that had improved the lives of quite a n...

The Criminal Investigations Department (CID) of the Ghana Police Service has begun investigations into alleged death threats against the Chairman of the Electoral Commission, Dr Kwadwo Afari-Gyan. The Director-General of the CID, Commissioner of Police (COP), Mr Prosper K. Agblor, told the Daily Graphic that although the EC boss had not reported the matter to the police, “once it is in the public domain, some officers have been sent to contact him and take his statement”. “He is not just an ordinary person. Even if he were an ordinary person, once he is threatened, and we know about it, we have to investigate,” he explained. Dr Afari-Gyan on Wednesday said he had received death threats because of the EC’s decision to creatE 45 new constituencies for the December polls. The decision has been dogged with controversies. On two separate occasions, the Constitutional Instruments (CIs) to give legal backing to the process had been withdrawn and relaid. While some civil society...

The police have picked three persons in connection with the serial killing of five women at Sogakope and its environs in the Volta Region. All the suspects, including Samuel Tsatsu, a 70-year-old farmhand, alias Adzaguda Razzick, and 37-year-old Jerry Kelvin, were arrested at Tefle, near Sogakope. The third suspect’s identity could not be established as according to the police, he was acting deaf and dumb. According to police records, the five women were murdered in similar method of operation in a period spanning September 16, 2011 to June 23, 2012. “All the five deaths followed similar characteristics. The bodies were found lying in supine positions with marks of violence and both legs opened. They were naked with two of them having red bands tied to their necks and hands.” Speaking at a press conference in Accra, the Director-General of the Criminal Investigations Department (CID), Commissioner of Police, Mr Prosper K. Agblor, observed that ever since the suspects were a...

The Institute of Statistical, Social and Economic Research (ISSER) of the University of Ghana, Legon, has lauded the government’s fiscal targets for 2012 and the measures to achieve them but maintains that achieving those benchmarks will be very difficult, in view of the anticipated spending on the December elections. It has predicted that apart from the government’s election year spending, continuing the implementation of the Single Spine Pay Policy (SSPP) will also come with its own toll on the economy. In a presentation preceding the launch of the ISSER State of the Ghanaian Economy in 2011 and Outlook Report in Accra Monday, the Deputy Director of the institute, Professor Felix Asante, urged the government to maintain policy credibility by not overspending in the run up to the December elections. The report highlighted how the Ghanaian economy fared in 2011 in the midst of the global economic crises and gave an outlook for 2012, in addition to prescribing some antidotes to ...

A GHANA Freedom Party (GFP) administration will nationalise all multi-national companies involved in the mining and petroleum industry. The Founder and leader of the party, Madam Akua Donkor, says this is to ensure that Ghanaians benefit from the country’s wealth. “We are allowing people to take away our resources while the very roads they travel to extract their resources are in such horrible states,” she told the Daily Graphic on a telephone. She said the mining industry had become so attractive that even the Chinese are migrating to Ghana in their numbers to exploit the mineral without recourse to the laws of the land. “What is bad about our agreements with these companies is that we don’t get value for the minerals they take away.” Madam Donkor said as a first step to ensuring that such companies were responsible, she had sued Newmont Gold Ghana Limited (NGGL) for what she described as “not giving enough back”. “Look at Libya; that country had oil but Al-Qathafi befo...

THE National Democratic Congress (NDC) is girding its loins for the launch of the party’s manifesto at Ho in the Volta Region on Thursday, October 4, 2012. The event, which will take place at the Volta Regional Capital, will be on the theme: “Advancing the Better Ghana Agenda: NDC working for you.” Key personalities expected to grace the occasion include President John Dramani Mahama, Vice-President Mr Paa Kwesi Amissah-Arthur, and other leading members of the party. Speaking to the Daily Graphic, the Mahama 2012 Campaign Coordinator, Mr Elvis Afriyie Ankrah, said President Mahama would highlight thematic areas in the manifesto which include education, job creation, health, the economy, agriculture and energy. He said the event would also be used to highlight promises the party made in 2008 and its achievement. “Our manifesto is based on concrete, realistic and workable proposals on keys issues confronting the country,” he added. The National Democratic Congress (NDC) is ...

An Assistive Technology for Visually Impaired Information Communication Technology (ICT) centre has been inaugurated for the Akropong School for the Blind. The GHC350, 00 projects, funded by the Ghana Investment Fund for Electronic Communications (GIFEC), is equipped with facilities like desktop computers, note takers, uninterrupted power system (UPS), air conditioners and an embosser which helps in the printing of braille documents. Equipment for the centre has been customised to meet the needs of the visually impaired, which include translations and talking keyboards. The Minister of Communications, Mr Haruna Iddrisu, who inaugurated the project, said the government was committed to distributing the national cake without discrimination. The minister said to further equip the school to provide its students with ICT knowledge, the ministry would construct a new information centre for the school next year. On behalf of GIFEC, he pledged 50 laptops with visually impaired supp...

The Trust Hospital, with links to the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT), does not attend to patients who subscribe to the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS). This is in spite of the fact that the hospital is affiliated to the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT), which retains two-and-half per cent of the 17.5 per cent contribution of the social security contributions of Ghanaians as a source of funding for the NHIS. But the hospital’s management maintains that the decision not to attend to NHIS card holders is to decongest the hospital and bring some level of sanity to health delivery at the facility. Speaking to graphhic.com.gh, the General Manager of the hospital, Dr Darius Kofi Osei, said the move was to reduce the strain associated with operating general services. “We are trying to discourage people coming to the centre of Accra just to treat malaria when they can get the treatment at our peripheral facilities,” he said. He sai...