General News of Tuesday, 23 March 2004

Source: Ghanaian Chronicle

Party Chairman exposes deals of "chop chop"

In an apparent bid to get rid of the District Chief Executive (DCE) for Bole, Alhaji Adam Achanso, the Bole-Bamboi Constituency Chairman of the NPP, Alhaji Mahama Salifu, rather exposed the corrupt deals he and the former DCE, Sam Akati Mahama, were involved in.

The Chairman did not only expose the former DCE, but also exhibited his ignorance about the rules and regulations regarding the award of contracts. In an interview with ?The Chronicle? newspaper at Bole, Alhaji Mahama boldly said, ?During the reign of the former DCE, all contracts were signed in my house or made known to me, but when Alhaji Achanso came he failed to follow the footsteps of his predecessor.?

He said the current DCE awarded contracts without informing him but rather informed the Sawla-Kalba Constituency Chairman.

The DCE also failed to come to greet him in his house whenever he returned from official trips as his predecessor had been doing, he said, adding, ?Even if he is travelling he would not inform me, but the President has tasked me to take care of him.?

According to the constituency chairman whenever the former DCE wanted ?to distribute contracts?, the two of them sat down to plan to whom they should award a contract. This was because, he said, as an old member of the NPP (since 1979) he knew ?the true supporters.?

He lamented that recently the DCE awarded some contracts, but gave him only a renovation job and he did not know how he distributed the ?proper? contracts. But he said he was not worried at all, because as an Alhaji, his God would be in control. Alhaji Mahama said he was not aware of the recent clash between his supporters and the DCE?s because he was then in Bawku for medical treatment.

However, on his return one of his supporters, Amadu Salifu Oluwinter, informed him that he (Oluwinter) had been invited to the Bolewura?s palace twice and to the DISEC, where he and the party?s second Vice Chairman, Amadu Kusah, had a clash. The DCE, Alhaji Achanso, confirmed that records on contracts awarded by the former DCE were not properly done.

He told The Chronicle that most of them were not passed through the tender board, adding, ?I would strictly abide by the law regarding the award of contracts.? He also denied that he had collected 25 cows from a Fulani herdsman to allow them into the district.

?I don?t have a single cow, so they were only telling lies about me,? he added.