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| Charles Asare, Ex-SSNIT Director General |
By
Ekow Mensah
Sources
sufficiently close to state security have hinted that Mr Charles Asare, former
Director- General of the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT)
has been invited for questioning in connection with the Obotan scandal.
Mr Asare who was an appointee of the Rawlings
Government was allegedly questioned about how SSNIT invested more than US$2.2
million in the Obotan project.
Under
the guise of building a new community, SSNIT was made to invest workers
Pensions money of more than $2million in a non-existent project.
An SFO investigation in 2003, described the
transaction as fraudulent and recommended the prosecution of Mr Asare and
several others.
Those the SFO asked to be prosecuted included
Ken Ofori- Atta, Director of SSB Investments Limited, Ekow Awoonor, Director of
SSB Investments Limited, George Otoo, Director of Enterprise Insurance Limited
and Daniel Seddoh, a Director of Obotan Development Limited.
The SFO also recommended that SSB investments
Limited, Enterprise Insurance Limited and Obotan Developers Limited should also
be prosecuted.
All
governments from 2003 to date have failed to implement the recommendation of
the SFO.
As
at now, there is no indication that the security services would invite others
mentioned in the SFO report for questioning.
Over the last three weeks there have been
persistent calls on state authorities to ensure that Pension Funds are properly
managed leading to a one week strike by some trade unions.
Speaking
at the Freedom Centre in Accra, Dr David Pessey, a member of the Socialist
Forum of Ghana (SFG) said workers have legitimate grievances over the
management of pension funds.
He however said the introduction of the 2nd
Tier Pension Scheme, was parts of the effort to privatise the Social Security
and National Insurance Trust.
Some of the companies which have been accused
of fraud in the management of Pension funds in the past have declared an
interest in managing the 2nd Tier Pension’s Scheme.
Editorial
True State of Economy
The
Ghana Trade Union Congress has issued a statement calling on the government to
introduce policies that will strengthen domestic industries and create
employment in both private and public sectors. This call amongst other
recommendations by the T.U.C must be highly commended as one of the few
positive contribution to the ongoing debate as to how Ghana can move out of the
cyclical economic crises that we find ourselves.
The
T.U.C in its statement, titled “Better policies and better management for a
better Ghana” called for a concrete effort by government to eradicate
corruption and made suggestions on public sector pay, Social Protection, cost
of living and the management of petroleum revenue. The government is expected
to read this statement carefully and adopt some of the prudent policies
recommended to it by the Ghana T.U.C. The Insight newspaper will like to
associate itself with the call by the T.U.C that the IMF cannot help Ghana.
Indeed
what the Bretton Woods institutions have succeeded in doing is to deepen
unemployment, open our market to unfair competition and the deindustrialization
of our economy. They have privatized the industries and now seek to take over
our social security system, Pension funds and energy sector. Ghanaians should
beware because one day we will wake up to realize the whole country has been
sold.
The
call for a strong and firm leader is quite poignant. But further to this the
leader must be actually aware of Ghana’s self- interest and he must understand
that, that self-interest is the interest of the majority of Ghanaians which is
made up of the working class, farmers, the unemployed, the galamsey and
dog-chain seller, the market woman etc. In the pursuit of their interest, a
strong, firm and nationalist leader is needed to promote policies with solutions to the myriad of problems
besetting these Ghanaians and stop being on the side of the neo-liberal
economic touting foreigners with their middle class lackey and allies.
CRIMES AGAINST THE STATE
Wofa
Kwesi Pratt Jnr, too many crimes have been committed against the people of
Ghana and these criminals have never paid for their crimes.
These
crimes have been perpetuated by Parliamentarians, Ministers of State and even
members of the Civil and Public services.
What
is this crime that I talk about? They come in many folds. The first is
unemployment and the low productivity of the Ghanaian economy.
The
laws debated and passed by the Ghanaian parliament never seek to address the
problems of the Ghanaian people. We are compelled to pay millions of Ghana cedi
everyday for the comfort and lavish lifestyles of our parliament, Ministers of
State, the Head of State and members of the judiciary for nothing.
The
laws Parliamentarians pass often go to benefit private-foreign multinational
co-corporations in the rob of the resources of our country. It was these same
parliamentarians who connived and sold key sectors of our industrial base to
thieves who come from Britain, the United States and elsewhere.
We
are being forced to accept without the right to protest that these crimes
committed by the Parliamentarian, the Minister of state and the Judges of the
court are permitted by the constitution of Ghana and if you dare muster courage
and confront these rogues, either by demonstration or other means of defiance
of the system, gun-wielding policemen will come full force at you with utmost
brutality.
The
radio, Newspapers and TV stations do no good. They invite headache to the human
brain and upset the stomach in the middle of the night. Listen to them and you
will vomit!
Objectivity
is lost. You hardly find any of the medium represent the genuine aspiration of
the true owners of our country-the trotro drivers, carpenters, Waakye sellers,
Koko sellers, farmers and truck pushers, the victims of the decadence of our
society.
President
John Mahama, Head of State and Commander in Chief of the Ghana Armed Forces and
Chairman of the Ecowas, drives me to tears anytime I hear him speak. He either
confuses me or pushes me to doubt his patriotism and love for Ghana.
President
Mahama stood in Parliament the last time he addressed the country on The State
of the Nation and bellowed out loudly that we can only revive our economic
fortunes only when we patronize made in Ghana goods.
He
explained that the Ghana Cedi was performing very poorly against the US dollar
and that we can rescue the Ghana Cedi by cutting the import of basic
commodities. Wofa Pratt, why we have chosen the US currency for international
trade in spite of the growing strength of the Chinese Yuan also bits my
imagination.
In fact the President mentioned that the
amount of goods we import compared to what we exported has led to trade
imbalances heavily weighed against our country.
Soon
after, I heard President Mahama on GBC Radio speaking at a summit in the United
Kingdom, accusing the Nigerian Government of not opening up its market for the
influx of goods from the world and that he could not understand why President
GoodLuck Jonathan and successive heads of state of Nigeria are overly
protective of the Nigerian economy.
At
this stage I was shattered and even more confused and begun wondering what the
true motives of our president really is. Increasingly, our politicians soon
forget why we voted them into power and as if they are cast under a spell of
magic, the face of the Whiteman continue to dazzle them that their courage is
soon lost.
They
soon forget about the plight and the promises they made to the truck pusher and
that young lady with a baby strap at the back with a heavy load of pure water.
Only
recently in a report by The Insight Newspaper, President Mahama, whilst
speaking at an event organized by the Ford Foundation in New York took a swipe
at late President Kwame Nkrumah.
According
to Mahama, President Nkrumah’s decision to encourage State intervention in
setting up State Enterprises to produce made in Ghana goods was a failure and
that the private sector must play that role.
Wofa
Kwesi Pratt, who is the private sector that President Mahama talks about?
As
already explained, I am not a racist bigot but a Ghanaian who holds strongly
the principle of fairness in international trade towards uplifting of the poor
people who loiter in our streets.
However,
our definition of the Private sector by the President is something I find as a
tool designed for the mass slaughter of the Ghanaian worker and his ingenuity.
Wofa
Kwesi Pratt Jnr, I have heard you lament and wept in uncontrollable tears the
deliberate destruction of state owned enterprises and indigenous local
companies by successive government since the overthrow of Dr Kwame Nkrumah and following
the return to multi-party democracy especially during the fourth republic.
One
after the other, road construction companies, housing companies and several
public institution built by the taxes of hard-working Ghanaian have either
being sold or stolen by government appointees.
I
am most convinced today more than ever, that the sight of beggers who line our
streets begging for alms, the twelve and thirteen year olds who chase behind
vehicle to sell chewing gums, does not disturb the conscience of the system.
Criminals
have taken over the state!
How
come that in the West, companies survive for a 100 years? Why do the States of
Europe and of the West bailout their banks and subsidize their farmers with
huge sums of monies?
The
thriving private companies we have in Ghana today are the ownership of European
and Eastern Asian business men and women.
They
have taken over our industries and turned them into ware-houses to store goods
from their country. They employ distraught Ghanaian workers under meager wages
and exploit them to work like beasts. This situation is most sorrowful. This is
slavery!
Uncle
Kwesi, I had the shock of my life when I was informed that when the World Bank
gives Ghana a certain amount of money as a loan, to for instance construct a
15km road from the Techiman township to Offuman, something strange happens. The
World Bank has a special club where countries like the UK, USA, France, Germany
and several others meet.
At
this meeting one country assuming Germany is elected to nominate a particular
company from that country to construct the road here in Ghana. Another country
from this special club say France is asked to appoint a company from that
country to provide the trucks needed for the construction and another is asked
to supply the Bitumin to cover the road. And they come with workers who take up
juicy position during the construction.
The
Ghanaian worker only gets to dig trenches to form the gutter under the heat of
the sun whilst others are made to serve as watchmen over the trucks at night.
In
the end, our local company never got the contract to construct the road and the
money given to the country as loan for which we are going to pay at a certain interest
never sat at the Bank of Ghana. How could we stab our country and her people in
the back like this and could this be the neo-colonialism Kwame Nkrumah spoke
about? This is a crime and somebody must be made to pay with his head.
It
appears that the elite and the political parties of Ghana have signed a secret
pact with the World Bank and IMF and that must explain why the bank holds sway
over every aspect of our national including life including how pensions of
workers must be managed.
Enter
the recent craze for the extraction of crude oil off-shore Ghana. So far, the
only reasonable comment our illiterate and over pampered parliamentarians and
government officials make is the talk about local content and even that the US
Embassy in Accra is not comfortable. Everything again has been handed over to
private-foreign multinational companies.
Our
only share of this resource went to Kufuor and his henchmen who managed to
scoop a certain portion of the raw material and sold for in the millions of
dollars. How much is the GNPC making from its involvement in this sector?
The
same situation finds expression with respect to timber logging and gold mining?
Our
huge forests endowed with timber are brought down and the timber, a critical
raw material is exported to the United Kingdom, the United States and China.
With this timber, the Chinese apply their mental labour and the outcome is
beautiful chairs our parliamentarians would take our taxes to buy and bring
them to Ghana by flight!
What
is it at all our parliamentarians do for us that they must sit on chairs made
in heaven? How many hours do they actually spend in that chamber? And how many
of them are able to read and understand the bills that are brought before them
for consideration? And if they do, how come that they muster courage to
transact loans from hair dressing salons and sign multi-million dollar
contracts written in Chinese?
How
many of our parliamentarians meet their constituents and discuss with them what
law they must promote towards the development of the country? The story is told
of a parliamentarian who has never visited his constituencies since he was
elected. Wofa Kwesi Pratt Jnr, we have been taken for granted for too long.
Mr
Tony Aubynn of the Chamber of Mines says that there is no need for Ghana to set
up a gold refinery because the foreign refinery situated in Switzerland is
operating below its capacity. Meanwhile, silver, a by-product of gold refinery
is also not brought back to the country and we have no idea how that product is
also managed.
So
in the end we have a certain class of Ghanaian people superintending over the
state and are wrecking havoc. They are comfortable because with the taxes that
we pay to the collection bowl, they can afford very delicious meal and ride in
the most expensive vehicles and a part of that proceed is used to buy arms for
the policeman to protect them.
We
are being forced to believe that the resources of our country including what
Kwame Nkrumah left for us as a free and independent people does not belong to
us and we can never manage them. It belongs to greedy men and women in white
and black skins. They were schooled at the Oxford and Buckingham Universities
and that by Devine right, they must be the owners of the earth and everything
found within it.
Government
in Ghana has become some sort of a shrine where particular characters are
allowed to go. This shrine can only be patronized by thieves and people who are
good at the practice of mis-invoicing, deception and slander.
Wofa
Kwesi Pratt Jnr, what makes these people skimming to maintain this rotten
system think that the situation will remain like this until tomorrow?
A
silent army has emerged and we will drive the greatest fear into them today.
They
can buy the most expensive armory for the armed forces but no force on earth
can withstand the wrath of a conscious and a united people.
They
have deliberately kept a few of our people into blind loyalties and these are
the rats within our midst who continue to sabotage our efforts at mobilization
towards the overthrow of this regime of illiterates, traitors, thieves and
agents of the West.
The
honey moon is over and the Ghanaian masses are silently preparing to overthrow
this system. This system is no longer responsive to the collective aspirations
of the Ghanaian people.
But
what must we do? We must organize. We must begin to read our history. Not just
any history, but the history of the independence struggle and what leading
lights like Kwame Nkrumah sort to teach us. This is the time for the oppressed
Ghanaian worker to reach out to each other. Whilst we read our history and
learn from there, let us meet in our communities and discuss with passion the
challenges that confront our communities.
Let
us remember that this road will not be smooth but that is the only way to take
power and create a new society devoid of the decadence of today.
Long
Live Ghana,
Long
Live the trotro driver,
Long
live the truck-pusher
Remain
strong, for victory is assured!
Abui
Gagbabi, a subsistence farmer from Amasaman.
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