Seth J. Bokpe's Ghana Newsreel

THE Food and Drugs Board (FDB) has directed the immediate withdrawal of the baby food, Beech-Nut Whole Grain Oatmeal and Mixed Fruit, from the market. The Beech-Nut Baby Food, with batch number 9909 B1 and expiry date of December 2010, is one of the products distributed by PNT Pharmacy Limited. According to the FDB, the order, which it said affected only the mentioned product and not other products or brands of the company, was necessitated by evidence of product deterioration caused by weevil infestation. Speaking to the Daily Graphic after conducting sample tests at the company’s warehouse and some retail outlets selling the product, the acting Head of Food Inspectorate of the FDB, Mr Kofi Essel, said the investigation and the directive were the result of a complaint received concerning two of the company’s products — the Beech-Nut Whole Grain Oatmeal and Mixed Fruit and the Beech-Nut Multigrain. He said after follow-up investigations through sampling and inspecting the products in ...

he Rural Impact Initiative/Eno Birago Charity Foundation has donated second-hand clothing and shoes worth GHC 700 to the Regent University College to support the school’s Rural Educational Empowerment Project(REEP). The donation, which was in response to the university’s appeal, would be distributed to school children in the Kyenkulabi L/A Primary School in the Kraboa-Coalter District of the Eastern Region to motivate them stay in school. Donating the items, the Chairperson of the Rural Impact Initiative/Eno Birago Charity Foundation, Mrs Yvone Birago Sasu, said her outfit was touched by the plight of the children in that community who had to go to school sometimes barefooted and sometimes wear tattered clothes. She said the foundation currently supports children who are deprived in the Dansoman community by paying their fees and providing them with clothes. She said even though there were a lot of children under the foundation’s care, a lot more needed to done to ensure that children ...

THE Australian High Commission has given financial assistance amounting to GH¢ 743,125 to 24 non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in the country to support their activities. The grant, which forms part of Australia’s development grant for the 2009-2010 financial year, would go into areas of education, health, rural projects, solar energy, skills training, sanitation, provision of potable water, and refurbishment of school buildings. Other areas where the grant is expected to be used are street lighting, assistance to women co-operative activities and human rights advocacy. Some of the beneficiaries are Global Action for Women Empowerment, for its bakery project, the North Tongu District Assembly, for the supply of dual desks; the Kumasi Girls Senior High School, for the setting up of a computer laboratory, and the Women in Law and Development Africa (WiLDAF), which received 98,135 Australian dollars (approximately GH¢125,844) to assist women in the Ahanta West District in the Wester...

THE Tema Oil Refinery (TOR) says there is more than enough Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) in the system and so there is no need for panick among consumers and this statement comes to assuage concerns of consumers following reports of shortage of LPG in some parts of Accra, resulting in long queues. Following reports of long queues in areas such as Adabraka and Awudome for LPG the Managing Director of the Tema Oil Refinery (TOR), Dr Kwame Ampofo, announced that TOR had more than enough LPG in the system. Dr Ampofo told the Daily Graphic that even though the recent inferno which engulfed the refinery had some impact on the supply of the product, supply had resumed and TOR had dispatched tankers for distribution to sale outlets reports Rose Hayford Darko from Tema. He stated that petrol was also being supplied from the various depots across the country and he did not envisage any shortage. Dr Ampofo expressed optimism that there would be no more queues when the tankers delivered the produc...

THE Ghana Prisons Service has organised a sensitisation programme to enlighten prison officers in the prospects of the new three-tier National Pension Scheme. The two-day programme, which was in collaboration with AA and K Consulting Services Limited, a tax and management firm, was attended by 50 prisons officers drawn from the 10 regions of the country. In a speech read on his behalf by the Chief Director of the Ministry of the Interior, Naana Ampratwum, the Minister of the Interior, Mr Cletus Avokah, said “the issue of workers’ pay and other emoluments had always been a sour point between the government and employees, especially in our part of the world, where government is the biggest employer”. Mr Avokah stated that the new scheme provided equity standards for all workers through the establishment of a uniform set of rules, regulations and standard for the administration and payment of retirement benefits to all workers, stating that the government had put stringent measures in pla...

THE Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA) has launched its Law School, with a pledge to help expand the frontiers of legal education in the country. This brings to three the number of public tertiary institutions offering courses leading to the award of Law degrees in the country. The other two are the University of Ghana, Legon, and the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST). The GIMPA Law Programme is a three-year programme that will concentrate on law for administration, management and corporate governance, with greater emphasis on the economy, administration, management and corporate governance-related law courses such as Commercial and Company Law, Contract and Administration. Other areas include security transactions, banking, development and decentralisation, insurance, taxation and revenue and public policy making. The programme is also expected to broaden legal knowledge and produce legal brains who will work generally in the publi...

The pioneers of the civil aviation industry in Ghana will be honoured annually beginning this year for their contributions to creating the country’s enviable safety records in the industry. A fund is also to be set up to support some of the retired pioneers who are in financial difficulties. The Chairman of the Kilo Alpha Aviation Holdings (KAAH), Captain Victor Kwesi Amoah, announced this at a press conference to highlight events of the celebration scheduled for December this year. The initiative, which is under the auspices of the Felvic Aviation Events (FAE), a subsidiary of KAAH, the Ghana Civil Aviation Authority and the Ministry of Transport (MoT) would also be used to demystify the aviation industry and bring it closer to the ordinary Ghanaian. The event, dubbed the “Wright Brothers Day,” would also eulogise Orville and Wilbur Wright, the two brothers who engineered and powered the world’s first aircraft. To achieve the objectives of the week-long celebration, a number of progr...