Wednesday, September 29, 2010

DZODZE CATHOLIC HOSPITAL INSTALS OXYGEN PLANT (PAGE 46, SEPT 29, 2010)

The Saint Anthony’s Catholic Hospital at Dzodze in the Ketu North District of the Volta Region has installed its own oxygen-generating plant. With the facility in place, the hospital can generate its own oxygen needs without going to L’ air Liquide in Tema for its supplies.
To man the plant, two technical staff of the hospital have been trained by the Medico Engineering and Supplies Ltd in Koforidua in the Eastern Region which supplied and installed the plant.
The plant was handed over to the hospital authorities at the weekend.
At the handover ceremony, Mr Mac-Okorwu, the Sales and Marketing Executive of Medico-Engineering said the plant, which cost GH¢84,000.00 was provided with a credit facility.
He said the hospital entered into a contractual agreement with them after they had been briefed on it.
The plant, called, MODULO2 , made in France, will be ready for use anytime oxygen was needed for operations.
The Medical Superintendent of the hospital, Dr William Gyan-Dwamena, received the plant and expressed the hospital’s satisfaction and its ability to acquire the facility.
Dr Gyan-Dwamena said the plant would save the hospital much time and expense in acquiring oxygen for their operations.

OVERCROWDING , CAUSE OF SKIN DISEASES IN HO PRISION PAGE 42, SEPT 29, 2010)

OVER crowding and poor diet for prisoners in the Ho Central Prisons have been identified as the major cause of skin diseases attacking the inmates.
According to the findings of the five-member committee set up by the Volta Regional Director of the Ghana Health Service and Ghana Prisons Service, 32 out of the 109 remand prisoners had various degrees of skin lesions on their buttocks, groins, backs, legs and abdomen.
The investigation was conducted on the orders of the Ho Circuit Court presided over by Justice Ernest Yao Obimpe.
The judge gave the order when one Amaglo Dela Vidza who appeared before him complained of rashes on his penis and anus.
The five-member committee found out that cells which were meant for 10 and 12 people, contained 53 and 56 inmates who had to be packed “like sardines with bodies touching one another when sleeping at night.”
Some of the remand inmates have been in the prison since 2001 and have appeared before court several times but they have neither been sentenced nor freed.
They also found out that the 60 pesewa feeding allowance per inmate was grossly inadequate to provide them any reasonably balanced diet three times a day to boost their immunity.
To solve the problem, the committee recommended that the courts should dispose of cases before them rapidly and should award fines in lieu of custodial sentences for minor offences like “ stealing of plantain.”
The committee also recommended the fumigation of cells and the isolation of persons with the skin diseases.
“If possible, the prison should be expanded since the population has increased,” the committee recommended.

Monday, September 27, 2010

EP CHURCH GOOD NEWS CHOIR MARKS 15TH MILESTONE (PAGE 46, SEPT 27, 2010)

The Evangelical Presbyterian Church, Ghana Good News Choir Union, has climaxed its 15th annual rally with a thanksgiving service at Gbi Wegbe in the Hohoe Municipality of the Volta Region.
The week-long rally, organised by the Central Presbytery of the Church, which attracted congregations from Have through Kwamikrom to Nkwanta was on the theme: “Rejoice over One Repentant Sinner”.
Preaching the sermon, Reverend W.R. Sakoe, Moderator of the Central Presbytery Synod, said as God was still searching for lost souls, it behoves leaders at all levels to change their attitude towards wrong doers by assisting them to reform.
Rev. Sakoe reminded the congregation that God wanted us to repent from our sins, since he was prepared to take us back.
“We should pray ceaselessly and obey the commandments of the Lord since God will never shower his favour upon a proud nation”.
He said society needed the contribution of all for it to succeed and that we should all join hands for its development, adding that since God did not cast anybody away from Himself, everybody should see him/herself as beneficial to society.
The Guest Speaker, Mr Prince Jacob Hayibor, Member of Parliament for the Hohoe North Constituency, called on the people to unite and eschew partisanship for progress and development.
“We need humility and modesty in all our endeavours in order to receive the blessing of God, “ Mr Hayibor said.
He called on the people to put up attitudes of righteousness, modesty and utmost commitment to ensure that the country moved along the right path for the achievement of its desired goals.
“You should pray for peace at all levels and also for the leadership of the country, ” Mr Hayibor said.
He said the country belonged to all of us, no matter our political position, so we should seek the progress of Ghana first in all that we did.
Mr Hayibor explained government policies and programmes to the congregation and urged those who had not as yet registered with the National Health Insurance Scheme to do so in order to access quality health care.
Mr Victor Herman Condobery, the Hohoe Municipal Chief Executive, called on the clergy to use the pulpit to preach to the youth to desist from negative attitudes.
He mentioned some of these attitudes as armed robbery, sakawa and ritual murders, which had assumed alarming dimensions.

Friday, September 17, 2010

DADEDO — A CLEAN COMMUNITY (PAGE 22, SEPT 17, 2010)

PEOPLE do not leave animals to stray at Dededo, a farming community near Tsito Awudome in the Ho Municipality in the Volta Region.
This is among the strict rules in the community encouraged by the late Mawufeame C.K. Wovenu, the founder and leader of the Apostolic Revelation Church.
Anyone who rears animals, especially sheep and goats, must confine them so that they do not litter the area.
A leading member of the church, Mr Nathaniel Fiador, told the Daily Graphic during a visit to the community over the weekend at the end of a three-day special fasting and prayer retreat programme by the church.
He said because animals were not allowed to stray, the community was very neat.
Mr Fiador stated that conflicts in the town were resolved by their pastors so they did not end up at the police station.
An opinion leader in the town, Togbe Isaac Azadagli, urged the youth to be law-abiding and stick to their books for a bright future.
“You should desist from drug abuse, premarital sex and other forms of social vices which will destroy your future,” he said.

Monday, September 13, 2010

COURT ORDERS INVESTIGATIONS INTO ANAL AND GENITAL INFECTIONS OF PRISONERS (PAGE 23 SEPT 13, 2010)

A Ho Circuit Court has directed the Volta Regional Directorate of the Ministry of Health (MOH) and the Volta Regional Commander of Prisons Service to investigate how prisoners at the Ho Prisons contracted anal and genital infections.
It also directed that the result of the investigations should reach the court within two weeks.
Mr Justice Ernest Yao Obimpe, who was sitting as an additional Circuit Court Judge, gave the order when four suspects appeared before the court.
“In consideration of my observation of this health problem, I am directing the Volta Regional Director of the MOH and the Commander of Prisons Service, Ho, to team up and investigate the cause of the sores and rashes around the anal and genital parts of suspects and find possible solution to it”, he said.
Justice Obimpe said he had observed that most of the remand prisoners brought before him from the Ho Central Prisons complained of rashes and sores in and around their anus and on the penises.
“I have had the chance of personally inspecting the backside of one remand prisoner, and what I saw was troubling, ” he lamented.
When contacted, Mrs Emma Sawyerr-Laryea, the Commander of the Prisons Service, Ho attributed the cause of the problem to the congestion in the prison.
She said instead of the 150 inmates the prisons had the capacity to accommodate, it now had more than 400 including 111 suspects on remand.
Mrs Sawyerr-Laryea also said the nutritional values of the food the prisoners were supplied with was low because they were given a budget of 60 Ghana Pesewas for three meals daily.
She appealed to the courts to assist in decongesting the prisons by not sending suspects on remand at the slightest chance. She suggested the Alternative Dispute Resolution method in finding solutions to some of the cases instead of sending them to court.

REGISTER DESIGNS AGAINST PIRACY (PAGE 23, SEPT 11, 2010)

The Chiefs and people of the Agotime Traditional Area have climaxed their week-long 12th Kente festival “Agbamevor za” with a grand durbar at Kpetoe in the Adaklu-Anyigbe District of the Volta Region.
The First Lady, Mrs Ernestina Naadu Mills, who was the guest of honour, advised players in the industry to register their designs to prevent them from being pirated.
She said this had become necessary because modern technology was capable of being used to pirate and exploit the designs to their disadvantage.
The festival was marked on the theme: “Kente, our Heritage for Wealth Creation”.
“The world is rapidly changing and the advancement of technology calls for innovation and creativity in order to sustain the Kente industry.
Technological advancement is both a threat and an opportunity; it can be used to improve the quality of designs and packaging of your products and at the same time, used to pirate designs at the expense of local artisans, ” she said.
Mrs Mills noted that as part of this year’s festival, an Eco-Tourism Centre known as the Nature Conservation Research Centre, had been inaugurated at Kpetoe to document, protect and preserve the Kente heritage for the benefit of future generations, and praised the organisers for it.
The First Lady also announced that a tomato processing factory would soon be established at Agotime to process the large quantities of tomatoes produced in the area and eliminate the perennial post-harvest losses due to the unavailability of market for the crop.
The Volta Regional Minister, Mr Joseph Amenowode, expressed happiness that the two projects which had been sited in the area to enhance the lives of the people.
The projects are the Eco-Tourism Visitors Centre funded by the European Union and the Agotime Afegame Women’s Bakery Project funded by the Australian High Commission.
Mr Amenowode said the vision of the bakery project was to expand into a vocational training centre to equip the youth with functional skills to enable them to contribute their quota to the development of their communities.
The District Chief Executive (DCE) for Adaklu-Ayigbe, Mr Michael Adjaho, expressed his gratitude to the chiefs and people for the prevailing peace which was promoting a lot of development in the area.
Mr Adjaho said within the 20 months that the National Democratic Congress (NDC) government had been in power, as many as 17 projects had been undertaken in the district.
These included the construction of five school blocks, extension of electricity to the Agotime Traditional Area, installation of street lights at Kpetoe and the reshaping of feeder roads from Akwetey to Mafi Kumasi and from Beh through Agbesia to Adokpakorfe.
The others are the construction of their district assembly office complex, reshaping and gravelling of the Kpetoe market road and culverts with the assistance of the Member of Parliament for the Ho East Constituency and Minister of Women and Children Affairs, Mrs Juliana Azumah Mensah, who hails from the area.
Mr Adjaho commended Mrs Azumah Mensah who was present at the function, for using her share of the MP’s Common Fund in assisting to solve the educational problems in the district.

Thursday, September 9, 2010

USAID, FINATRADE SUPPORT RICE FARMERS (SPREAD, SEPT 9, 2010)

Eight hundred and four rice farmers in the Hohoe municipality have benefited from farming equipment worth $40,000 provided by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
The gesture was facilitated by Finatrade to boost rice production in the area.
The equipment comprised a combined rice harvester for cutting, threshing and bagging of rice and an automatic rice seeder.
Presenting the items, the Group Chairman of Finatrade, Mr Nabil E. Moukarzel, said the presentation formed part of the company’s continued support for rice farmers in the country.
Rice cultivation is a dominant agricultural activity in the municipality, with the 438 acres currently under cultivation.
Mr Moukerzel said Finatrade was also providing a guaranteed market for all rice farmers in the country provided that their produce met the requirements of the Ghanaian consumer.
He said as a private company, Finatrade was fully committed to the long-term success of local rice production in the country.
He said the company had also negotiated with some of the banks to assist farmers access loans to expand their farms.
In September 2009, Finatrade donated GH¢30,000 to the Ghana Rice Inter-Professional Body (GRIB), to provide post-harvest structures to improve the quality and standardisation of locally produced rice in deprived communities in the country.
A representative from USAID, Ms Pearl Achah, pledged her organisation’s support to help boost agricultural production in the country.
She urged the farmers to endeavour to produce quality rice, especially when they have been supported with equipment.
The Volta Regional Director of the Ministry of Food and Agriculture (MoFA), Mr John Tsrakasu, stressed the need for the harmonisation of rice projects, as well as other agricultural productions for sustainable development.
A rice nucleus farmer, Mr Mensah Adams, on behalf of the rice farmers, thanked USAID and Finatrade for the support and appealed to the institutions to help them with equipment that could easily remove tree stumps and plough the valleys in which they cultivated their rice farms.

Monday, September 6, 2010

SUPPORT VULNERABLE IN CHURCH FINANCIALLY (PAGE 23, SEPT 4, 2010)

THE Volta Regional Minister, Mr Joseph Amenowode, has urged churches to financially support needy members of their congregations to enable them to engage in income-generating activities and lead dignified lives to contribute their quota to the development of the church.
Mr Amenowode suggested that they could start by operating savings and loans schemes to support the needy members.
The volta regional minister was addressing the congregation during the opening session of the second General Assembly of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church, Ghana, at Peki in the South Dayi District last Thursday. It was on the theme: “Enhancing Human Dignity”.
This, he said, was necessary because the bible enjoined humanity to lead orderly lives and work to earn their own living.
“ Any work, that is not exploitative of another, but enables one to take care of oneself and his or her dependants and saves one from always looking up to others to clothe and feed him or her is dignifying and honourable, ” he said.
Mr Amenowode added that, one did not necessarily need to be wealthy to command respect but must earn respect by being disciplined, honest, principled, faithful and exhibiting descent lifestyle.
He commended the church for initiating vocational and other trades training programmes.
“ We as a government would continue to initiate appropriate policies and provide the framework to facilitate private sector participation in the nation’s efforts at human resource development, ” the minister said.
Mr Amenowode exhorted the church to study the government’s national youth policy very well to identify whatever role they could play to ensure its successful implementation.
In his welcoming address, the Rt Rev. Francis Amenu, the Moderator of the General Assembly of the E.P. Church, lashed at the plethora of injustices being meted out by man against his fellow man in the society.
Rt Rev. Amenu condemned, in no uncertain terms, the upsurge of child trafficking incidents in the country.
He appealed to parents, guardians, transport operators, fishing boat operators and other ‘gold-miners’ involved in such nefarious acts to consider, as a priority, the welfare, education and career development of the innocent and ignorant children.
The moderator commended the collaborative efforts of the security personnel and some concerned members of the public in helping to bring the situation under control.
He noted with concern that “ the ethnic minority, people of other faith persuasion, the physically challenged, illiterates and other vulnerable in the society, were often treated as outcasts while female genital mutilation, widowhood rites, running of witches colonies, trial by ordeal and trokosi practices are thriving in our communities”.
Apart from that, Rt Rev. Amenu expressed regret that the peddling of falsehood, callously tarnishing the image and hard-won reputation of others, character assassination, sacrifices and other de-humanising acts were also on the increase.
He said the current spate of unrest in most of the churches which made aggrieved members to take the law into their own hands by using very unorthodox means to seek redress to administrative disputes was worrying and brought the church into disrepute.
All these injustices, he said, worked against the dignity of the individual, who was created in the image of God and was to lead life devoid of any violation.
The moderator commended the media for serving as watchdogs in exposing lapses in the country.
He reminded social commentators and callers to phone-in programmes to note that there was a limit to freedom of expression and they must, therefore, exercise a high sense of decorum and decency in their comments and expression.