Teachers allowance back in first NPP budget - Sammy Awuku

The National Youth Organiser of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Mr. Sammy Awuku, has said that the first budget of the Nana Addo-led administration would capture the allowances of teacher and nursing trainees.

The allowances, which were scrapped by the outgoing National Democratic Congress (NDC) government, was met with strong resistance from the teacher trainees, who complained bitterly about the difficulties it had brought upon them. The excuse given by the NDC government for embarking on such an action was that it would help the government create more of such institutions to enroll more people, as the government could use the huge amount of money it paid as allowances to establish more of such institutions.

Also, the outgoing Vice President, Paa Kwesi Amissah Arthur, once defended that restoring the allowances would threaten the future of Ghana’s economy. He further told students of the Nalerigu Nursing and Midwifery College in the Northern Region, to disregard promises by the then opposition NPP to restore the allowances, citing that it would not be in the interest of the state.

Following persistent protests by the students from the affected training institutions, the government was compelled to set up a committee, which recommended that the students be met halfway. Subsequently, the government started paying GH¢150 to each of the nursing-trainees in the heat of the election campaign, but the teacher- trainees were left out.

Meanwhile, the NPP, prior to this year’s elections, assured students of the various teacher and nursing training institutions of the party’s commitment to bring back the allowances, to ensure they had smooth training to serve the country.

That notwithstanding, the promise of the NPP was rubbished by communicators of the NDC, including the Vice President, who said the future of the country would be jeopardised if the allowances were restored.

However, speaking with the media at the Alisa Hotel in Accra yesterday, Mr. Sammy Awuku reiterated the promise of the next government to restore those allowances. He noted that the first budget of the NPP would have in it the allowances and other interventions, to enable corporate Ghana also get support to grow.

On the other hand, the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the NPP met yesterday at the Alisa Hotel for the first after winning the elections. Though there was no official press briefing, checks by this reporter revealed that the leadership of the party reminded themselves of the need to help the President-elect Nana Addo and the party to be able to carry out its promises made in its manifesto.

NDC Organiser curses executives for “chopping” campaign money

A deputy Western Regional Women's Organizer of the National Democratic Congress, Araba Tagoe, has heaped curses on all colleague executives for hijacking monies and other resources meant for the party's electioneering campaign, adding that posterity will never forgive them for contributing to their party's humiliating defeat in just-ended elections.

A deputy Western Regional Women's Organizer of the National Democratic Congress, Araba Tagoe, has heaped curses on all colleague executives for hijacking monies and other resources meant for the party's electioneering campaign, adding that posterity will never forgive them for contributing to their party's humiliating defeat in just-ended elections.

Speaking in a radio interview in Takoradi last Wednesday, the embittered deputy women's organiser said the executives were never going to have it easy for contributing to the party’s defeat.

She maintained that the executives did nothing to add up to the work of President John Dramani Mahama, adding that they were only interested in their interest and not that of the party.

The visibly angry organiser raged, “God will really punish you for sabotaging our hardworking President's efforts.”

Madam Tagoe described the attitude of her colleagues as criminal and called on the police to investigate, arrest and prosecute all of them for diverting the party’s monies into their accounts.

According to her, she cannot bring herself to understand why such greedy and unscrupulous party executives could hijack campaign resources with the intent of pushing the NDC into opposition.

She mentioned one Anita Annan as one of the persons who squandered campaign money.

Madam Tagoe’s allegations somehow confirm the mysterious disappearance of two truckloads of gas cylinders and bags of rice from the regional office after they were brought to the region for vote buying.

With GHC20, 000 being the least amount of campaign money sent to each of the 28 constituencies in the region, Madam Tagoe said some of her colleagues claimed their parcels got missing after they were delivered.

She pointed out that the NDC executives did nothing to contribute to the party’s campaign but only engaged in thievery and misappropriation of campaign cash, adding that they did not only refuse to cooperate and open up to her two deputies but also hijacked campaign resources meant for the women’s wing.

She maintained that the hijacking of campaign resources was a deliberate move by loyalists of Nana Toku to sabotage the administration of "Big Aidoo," their regional chairman.

Information available to the Daily statesman has it that those scheming for the re-election of Nana Toku as the regional party chairman popped champagne over their party's abysmal performance in the region.

Contrary to "Big Aidoo's" dream of snatching more parliamentary seats for the NDC in the Western Region, the party lost 8 out of its 18 seats to the NPP.

But Madam Tagoe insisted all those sabotaging the administration of "Big Aidoo" would bow down their heads in shame because of the resolve to re-elect him for another four-year term at the Party's next regional Congress.

Congo crisis talks suspended till Wednesday

 Opponents of Congolese President Joseph Kabila (C) accuse him of delaying the presidential vote in the hope of tweaking the constitution to extend the Kabila family's hold over the nation. By Junior D.Kannah (AFP/File)

Kinshasa (AFP) - Congolese crisis talks to ensure a peaceful political transition were suspended Saturday, Catholic church mediators said, announcing they would resume Wednesday, the day after President Joseph Kabila's last legal term in office ends.

"Direct negotiations are suspended", Monsignor Marcel Utembi, the head of the Congolese bishops conference (CENCO).

The announcement ended 11th-hour talks between Kabila's ruling party and opposition groups to find a path forward for the Democratic Republic of Congo after December 20, when Kabila's second term ends.

The political transition talks won't resume until December 21, Utembi said.

"There is no deal," said Jean-Marc Kabund, the secretary general for the Union for Democracy and Social Progress (UDPS) party of the main opposition leader, Etienne Tshisekedi.

"The ruling majority is sitting on its positions and refuses to offer any concessions on matters that require a political response," he said.

Joseph Kabila

The Congolese constitution bans presidents from serving a third term, but Kabila has shown no signs of stepping down and no elections have yet been planned, prompting fears the situation could descend into violence.

The 45-year-old president has signalled his desire to remain in power until a successor is chosen in an election, but some opposition figures want him to hand over to a transitional leadership while awaiting the vote.

Fears of violence

The CENCO-sponsored talks had brought together the ruling party and fringe opposition groups, allied against a mainstream opposition coalition led by the 84-year-old Tshisekedi.

The latter accuse Kabila of delaying the vote in the hope of tweaking the constitution to extend his family's hold over a nation hugely rich in minerals that is almost the size of western Europe.

Kabund, speaking to the media after the talks broke up, said: "We call on the people to carry out their responsibilities with respect to the... date marking the end of Kabila's mandate", referring to a midnight Tuesday deadline.

The church mediators have warned that failure to find a political settlement would lead to "an uncontrollable situation".

The international community has also warned the current tension could descend into violence, and Western diplomats in Kinshasa this week urged all non-essential nationals to leave the country.

Some two decades ago, Congo sunk into the deadliest conflict in modern African history, its two wars in the late 1990s and early 2000s dragging in at least six African armies and leaving more than three million dead.

A democratic handover would break ground for Congo's 70 million people who since independence from Belgium in 1960 have never witnessed political change at the ballot box.

In the last few years hundreds of people have died in political violence in the capital, Kinshasa, and elsewhere.

Tshisekedi and his allies had threatened nationwide protests from Monday to press Kabila to step down, but opted to hold off pending the negotiations.

The government has ordered that social networks including Facebook and WhatsApp be blocked from 11:59 pm (2259 GMT) on Sunday.

Police set up road checkpoints in Kinshasa, while the Republican Guard patrolled the capital's administrative district Saturday near the presidential palace, AFP journalists reported.

Source: www.modernghana.com

I’LL CONSIDER OFFER TO SERVE UNDER NPP GOV’T – OKOE VANDERPUIJE

Outgoing Mayor for Accra, Alfred Okoe Vanderpuije says he will mull over his options should an offer be placed before him to serve in the government of President-elect Nana Akufo-Addo.

Vanderpuije has been the Chief Executive of the capital city for the past 8 years under the New Democratic Congress (NDC) government but is to bow out midnight January 6, 2017 due to the outcome of the 2016 election which has brought about a change of regime to the New Patriotic Party (NPP).

Speaking in an interview on GHOne TV’s morning show #GHToday Thursday, Mr. Vanderpuije suggested that his services is not on auto-pilot for a particular political party but to the betterment of Ghana.

“We are all Ghanaians; we are ready to serve our nation. Depending on who is leader of this country, when the leader calls we would consider and then we would say YES or NO based on what would be put before us,” he told Kafui Dey.

“I am always and ever ready to serve Ghana. Whoever is the leader, if I get a call which says that we want you to consider this offer, at that point we will look at it,” Okoe Vanderpuije added.

Although his party is leaving power, Mr. Okoe Vanderpuije remains in public service after coming tops in the contest for the Ablekuma South parliamentary seat.

He said: “At this point, the people of Ablekuma South say Okoe we want you to go and serve at Parliament so that’s what I’m going to do now. The most important thing is that I will go to Parliament and will serve effectively from there.”

Candidate Nana Akufo-Addo of the NPP polled 53.85% of votes casts in the 2016 election to unseat incumbent President John Mahama.

Source: Dan Kwasi Prince // www.dailyviewgh.com / Ghana

I HAVE REGRETTED CAMPAIGNING FOR MAHAMA AND NDC GOVERNMENT – MUGABE

Broadcast Journalist and host of ‘Pampaso’ on Accra-based Montie FM Salifu Maase affectionately called Mugabe, on his show on Monday together with his panelists turned their fury at functionaries of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) for the electoral defeat.

Mugabe, Kojo Yeboah a member of the NDC Communications team and another panelist threw deafening salvos at government appointees under the Mahama-led administration as well as national and regional executives of the party.

They blamed them squarely for the party’s woes at the polls saying” Omane Boamah and his lots built barricades around the president meanwhile your vote is 1. You and Haruna Iddrisu had your interests so didn’t make him win”

According to Kojo Yeboah, the New Patriotic Party’s (NPP’s) National Youth Organizer Sammie Awuku worked tirelessly to secure the party’s victory but that could not be said about his colleague in the NDC.

“See how Sammie Awuku worked, that Sidi or Coins, whatever his name is, that guy of a youth organizer in NDC was not heard for a day. In 2008 when NPP was about to lose they had all the actorsand musicians on their part. The monies given to them can take care of 10 constituencies. They were useless in the campaign”, he added.

The trio also took a swipe at the Finance Minister Seth Tekper for the introduction of various taxes stating “Seth Tekper wanted to collect tax from pensioners. Till now pensioners think they pay tax.

He’s part of the reasons why we lost, “Ewe” people can’t afford plane fares and you’re campaigning with planes and you think they will vote for you. Ask NPP to bring presidential materials and they will bring 1000 men, ask NDC to bring one and they will bite their fingers. NDC, John Mahama is all you have and you’ve made him lose”

Source: Dan Kwasi Prince // www.dailyviewgh.com / Ghana

Russia challenges US to prove campaign hacking claims or shut up

The United States must either stop accusing Russia of meddling in its elections or prove it, a spokesman for Russian President Vladimir Putin said Friday.

Presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov said it was "indecent" of the United States to "groundlessly" accuse Russia of intervention in the US election campaign, Russian state news agency Tass reported.

"They should either stop talking about that or produce some proof at last. Otherwise it all begins to look unseemly," Peskov reportedly said about the latest accusations that Russia was responsible for hacker attacks.

President Barack Obama on Thursday vowed retaliatory action against Russia in the light of allegations that it meddled in the US presidential election campaign.

"I think there is no doubt that when any foreign government tries to impact the integrity of our elections that we need to take action and we will at a time and place of our own choosing," he told NPR.

What is known about the hacking

• Data and thousands of emails were stolen from the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton's campaign chairman, John Podesta, among other targets.

• US intelligence agencies in October pinned blame on Russia for campaign-related hacking.

• WikiLeaks, which published much of the information obtained by hacking, has refused to reveal its sources.

• The United States has not alleged that Russia interfered with the voting process on Election Day.

'Sophisticated tools'

A US official familiar with the election-related hacking told CNN Thursday that the operation was carried out with sophisticated hacking tools, suggesting that Putin was involved.

The source said while Putin's "fingerprints" were not on the hacking, "the nature of the operation was such that this had to be approved by top levels of the Russian government."

Russian cyberhacking activity has continued largely unabated since the election, including against US political organizations, US officials briefed on the investigation told CNN.

US President-elect Donald Trump dismissed the US intelligence community's assessment, in comments Sunday.

 He suggested that there was no proof Russia had hacked the election, saying the snooping in Democratic Party servers and emails of Clinton campaign staffers could have been done by China or even someone sitting in New Jersey.

Clinton: Putin grudge was behind hack

Clinton said Thursday night that Putin's alleged involvement in the hacking of Democratic organizations during the 2016 election stemmed from a longtime grudge the Russian President has held against her.

Meanwhile, her campaign chairman, Podesta, issued a scathing rebuke of the FBI.

He wrote in a Washington Post op-ed that the bureau's "seemingly lackadaisical response to the very real Russian plot to subvert a national election" by comparison with its overzealous investigation of Clinton's emails "shows that something is deeply broken" there.

Former Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili told CNN Friday that he was not surprised by the US claims against Russia.

"Well I almost was, like, vindicated when the same administration in Washington suddenly started to speak about Russian involvement in the election," he said, speaking in the Ukrainian capital, Kiev.

"Because we, for me, it's déjà vu. They were the same people telling us, "no, no, it cannot possibly be true." And now it came to their doorsteps. And of course he [Putin] does all those things. Of course he is a great master."

Source: edition.cnn.com

Putin turned Russia election hacks in Trump's favor: U.S. officials

Russian President Vladimir Putin supervised his intelligence agencies' hacking of the U.S. presidential election and turned it from a general attempt to discredit American democracy to an effort to help Donald Trump, three U.S. officials said on Thursday.

U.S. intelligence agencies' conclusion that Russia tried to influence the election by hacking people and institutions, including Democratic Party bodies, has angered President-elect Trump, who says he won the Nov. 8 vote fairly. Russian officials have denied accusations of interference in the U.S. election.

Separately, a senior White House official said on Thursday that Putin was likely to have been aware of the cyber attacks but he fell short of accusing the Russian president.

"I don't think things happen in the Russian government of this consequence without Vladimir Putin knowing about it," Ben Rhodes, the White House's deputy national security adviser, told MSNBC. "When you're talking about a significant cyber intrusion like this, we're talking about the highest levels of government."

The U.S. officials - who have knowledge of intelligence information on the matter - said on the condition of anonymity that the hacking of U.S. political groups and figures had a more general focus at first.

"This began merely as an effort to show that American democracy is no more credible than Putin's version is," one of the officials said.

"It gradually evolved from that to publicizing (Hillary) Clinton's shortcomings and ignoring the products of hacking Republican institutions, which the Russians also did," the official said.

By the fall, the official said, it became an effort to help Trump's campaign because "Putin believed he would be much friendlier to Russia, especially on the matter of economic sanctions" than Democratic rival Clinton.

Democratic President Barack Obama said in an interview with National Public Radio that the United States will take action against Russia.

"I think there is no doubt that when any foreign government tries to impact the integrity of our elections ... we need to take action and we will," he said according to excerpts of the Thursday interview released by NPR.

FILE PHOTO - U.S. Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump appears at a campaign roundtable event in Manchester, New Hampshire, U.S., October 28, 2016. REUTERS/Carlo Allegri/File Photo

"At a time and a place of our own choosing. Some of it may be ... explicit and publicized; some of it may not be. ... Mr. Putin is well aware of my feelings about this, because I spoke to him directly about it," Obama said.

NBC reported earlier that U.S. intelligence officials have "a high level of confidence" Putin was personally involved in the Russian cyber campaign against the United States.

Hacked emails of Democratic operatives and Clinton aides were leaked during the presidential campaign, and at times dominated the news agenda. The U.S. officials said Russia also hacked Republicans but did little to nothing with the information they found.

PUTIN ROLE?

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told state TV channel Rossiya-24 that he was "dumbstruck" by the NBC report of Putin's alleged involvement.

"I think this is just silly, and the futility of the attempt to convince somebody of this is absolutely obvious," he said.

Trump, who takes office on Jan. 20, has brushed off reports of Russian hacking of U.S. political institutions.

"If Russia, or some other entity, was hacking, why did the White House wait so long to act? Why did they only complain after Hillary lost?" Trump wrote in a post on Twitter on Thursday.

In fact, the U.S. government did formally accuse Russia of a campaign of cyber attacks against U.S. political organizations in October - one month ahead of the election.

Obama last week ordered a review by the U.S. intelligence agencies about foreign interference in the 2016 election.

Asked on Thursday about the hacks, Secretary of State John Kerry described how Obama had been considering the evidence ahead of the October announcement.

"The president made the decision based on the input that was carefully, carefully vetted by the intelligence community ... that he did have an obligation to go out to the country and give a warning. And he did so," Kerry said at a news briefing.

The three U.S. officials who spoke to Reuters said the fact that Putin oversaw a hacking operation was not surprising and is standard operating procedure in Russia.

"If anything, given his background as a KGB officer, Putin has a much tighter grip on all Russian intelligence operations, civilian and military, foreign and domestic, than any democratic leader does," one official said.

The reports of Russian hacking have raised concerns among both political parties in Congress, with top Republicans breaking with Trump to call for closer scrutiny.

Some Republican lawmakers have also questioned Trump's pick for Secretary of State, Exxon Mobil Corp Chief Executive Rex Tillerson, who has close business ties to the Russian government.

(Reporting by Washington newsroom and Vladimir Soldatkin in Moscow; Writing by Yara Bayoumy; Editing by Alistair Bell)

Source: reuters.com

You Need To See These Photos Of Rev. Owusu Bempah’s Post-Election Church Service

This is Rev. Owusu Bempah.

The general overseer of the Glorious Word and Power Ministry International is known for his new year prophecies. In 2016, he prophesied a big win for the opposition leader, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo and the NPP. He further claimed that even if the incumbent should bring down angels from heaven to vote for him, he will still lose.

His prophecy has come to pass as the opposition leader of the NPP Nana Addo Dankwah Akuffo-Addo has been declared the new president of Ghana.

During his victory speech, the president-elect, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, gave him props and this saw many supporters cheering at the mention of his name.

Today, being the first church service after the election saw many supporters of the NPP trooping to his church to cheer and jubilate with him. 

Supporters of the NPP clad in their party colours at the premises of the church.

The old and the young all joined in the fun.

Yes!! There was a brass band celebration too. The police were not left out.