Wa, July 16, GNA - Sixteen Financial Extension Agents (FEAs) of the Micro-Finance and Small Loans Centre (MASLOC) who are responsible for the recovery of loans from defaulters in the Upper West region have not been paid their salaries for the past eleven months

This is affecting their zeal and ability to go round the communities to retrieve monies from defaulters Mr. Simon Yiryel, Upper West Regional Coordinator of MASLOC, told the Ghana News Agency in an interview at Wa on Wednesday.

He said the beneficiaries of the loans were scattered in the region and because the agents had not been paid their emoluments for almost one year they were reluctant to use their own resources to track defaulters.

Mr. Yiryel said apart from the Disaster Victims Support credit, two other types of loans namely, Smaller Loans and Micro-credits amounting to about 600,000 Ghana cedis was disbursed to groups and individuals in the region

He said the rate of recovery was good and had confidence in the ability of these personnel to retrieve substantial amounts of the loans if they were motivated through regular payment of their salaries.

Apart from the FEAs he said the other staff of his outfit, were receiving their salaries regularly.

"I must stress that it is not that these people don't want to pay. They know through our awareness creation campaigns that they collected loans that must be paid back."

"If the credits were money meant for Party members they would have collected them from Party offices", he said in reference to concerns that some people were not paying because they regarded it as party money.

Mr. Yiryel said only four vehicles were given out in the region out of which one has been impounded for not meeting the payment schedule.

The owner has however recently produced evidence of payment and the car would soon be released to him, he said.