31/10/2023
DENKYEMBOUR DISTRICT ASSEMBLY HOLDS GENERAL ASSEMBLY MEETING
On Monday 30th October 2023, Denkyembour District Assembly held its second ordinary meeting of the General Assembly for the year 2023 at the District Assembly Hall. The meeting began with an opening prayer at around 10:30 am.
The Presiding Member for the assembly; Honourable Kennedy Asante, expressed his gratitude to all assembly members, the Member of Parliament, heads of departments, Nananom and all guests for honouring the invitation. He also appealed to the assembly members to give out their maximum cooperation during the meeting. He then took the house through a discussion on actions taken and recommendations from the previous meeting.
There was a brief sensitization from the District Registration Officer of the National Identification Authority. He first and foremost informed the house about the ongoing registration of the Ghana Card. He mentioned that citizens who wishes to make changes on their cards should could also come to the office for those changes. He however appealed to assembly members to educate their electorates on the vouching process in order to ensure a smooth registration process. He lastly mentioned that the registration was backed by a lot of laws and regulations hence some delay in the process.
The Returning Officer of the Electoral Commission was also invited to brief the house to on recent electoral processes within the district. He mentioned that there was limited registration of eligible voters in the past weeks and transfer of votes. He added that there would be exhibition of the voters register at the various polling stations from 3rd November to 9th November 2023. He lastly added that nomination and filing of forms for prospective candidates in the District Level Elections.
The Member for Parliament for Akwatia Constituency, Honourable Henry Boakye Yiadom also addressed the General Assembly. He expressed his gratitude to all assembly members and heads of departments for giving him the audience to address the general assembly. He presented his projects and programs that he had undertaken since he assumed office as Member of Parliament. Major projects he presented include Construction of 1 No. 3 Unit Islamic Block, construction of small water system with poly tank, construction of Emergency Block at GCD Hospital, Reshaping and maintenance of road in selected communities and construction of 3 unit classroom block in Sakyikrom. He lastly expressed his gratitude to everyone for their support.
The District Chief Executive for the Denkyembour District; Honourable Seth Birikorang Ofosu was called upon to deliver his sessional address to the house. He began by expressing his gratitude to all members present.
He centred his address on Finance, Security, Developmental Projects, Education, Health, Agriculture, Community and Social Development and Administrative issues.
On Finance, he mentioned that the assembly as at 30th September 2023 had realized total IGF revenue of GHC 1,018,767.35 as compared with total IGF revenue budget of GHC 1,521,090.00 which represented 66.98% of the budget. The total budgeted expenditure for the period stands at GHC 1,521,090.00 and the total actual expenditure of GHC 1,010,261.30 which represent 66.42% of the expenditure budget.
On issues of health, the Directorate collaborated with the Ghana Education Directorate received 4,082 school bed nets and distributed 4,045 to schools within the district, for both public and private. In all, 1,221 male and 2,824 females benefited from the program. Also, there was national COVID-19 mass vaccination that was carried out with a total of 696 individuals who were vaccinated out of a target group of 1501.
On Education, he mentioned that the Basic Education Certificate Exams took place at four centers which started from 7th July 2023 to 11th July 2023. Additionally, the Education Directorate participated in the inter-zonal festival of arts and culture from 14th September to 16th September 2023. Lastly, the directorate participated in the inter-zonal regional sports competition which also took place from 19th July 2023 to 22nd July 2023.
Lastly on issues of Agriculture, he mentioned that the district assembly trained 36 farmers on the control of Fall Army Worms. The department also trained 33 farmers and technical staff on improved breeding of farm animals like small ruminants, poultry and pigs and livestock production as business. He finally added that the department training of 6 market enumerators on the use of weighing scale, electronic balance analytical scale and standardization in measurement in market places.
He then presented the reports from the seven sub-committees of the assembly. The house approved the DCE sessional address which included the Executive Committee report.
The Presiding Member also led the discussion and approval of the 2024 Draft Composite Budget, Fee-Fixing Resolution, Revenue Improvement Action Plan and Draft Annual Action Plan.
The Presiding Member in his concluding remarks expressed his gratitude to all members and heads of departments including Nananom and the representatives of the religious bodies for taking time out of their busy schedules to attend the meeting.
Credit
Elvis Offei-Bekoe
(DIO - Denkyembour)