Posted on: www.dailyguideghana.com
By William Yaw Owusu
Thursday, November 6, 2014
The Krachiwura, Nana
Mprah Besemuna III, who was expected to appear again before the Commission of
Enquiry investigating the payment of judgement debts yesterday failed to honour
the invitation.
The paramount chief of
Krachi Traditional Area who is also a retired police commissioner, was expected
to testify on the Volta Basin Reimbursable Fund created by some claimants
following the construction of the Akosombo Hydro Electric Dam in the 1960s but
his lawyer Kwame Yankyera appeared to say that the chief was indisposed.
“The Krachiwura came
down from Krachi upon the subpoena but he has been taken ill,” counsel told
Sole-Commissioner Justice Yaw Apau, adding “I had interactions with him and put
down notes as his answer to the questions the subpoena posed and he appended
his signature.”
Reimbursable Fund
The commission is
investigating the circumstances that led to the setting up of the Reimbursable
Fund in 2010 with the chief as a principal actor where15% of the total of
GH¢130million approved by the government was supposed to be deducted by the
Lands Valuation Division and paid to the fund.
Influencing public officials
Evidence before the
commission indicated that the agenda of the Volta Basin claimants was to
influence public officials to “facilitate and procure” (in their own words)
payment of compensation monies after the government had paid the first two
tranches in 2009 and early 2010.
Cabinet, in July 2008, had approved a
consolidated amount of compensation totalling GH¢138 million for various
stools/families in Pai, Apaaso, Makango, Ahmandi and Kete Krachi Traditional
Areas. An estimated 57 groups were said to have benefited from the amount.
Documents before the
commission shoed that GH¢ 1,237,721.00 was the 15% paid to the Association of
VR Flooded Lands Compensation Claimants chaired by Krachiwura Nana Mprah
Besemuna III.
GH¢71m disbursed
Records at the commission revealed that GH¢71
million has been paid so far to the various claimants and the disbursement of
the remaining GH¢67 million has been put on hold to enable the government deal
with discrepancies in the payments.
Some of the witnesses who appeared before the
commission have been tendering in evidence site plans that did not have dates
but had purportedly been used to claim the money from the Lands Commission.
Some of the documents also bore the names of
individual claimants; but the witnesses have claimed they were making the
claims on behalf of families or clans.
Apau Shocked
Justice Apau has variously expressed shock at
how the Lands Commission could have proceeded to order the release of the
various amounts of money to the claimants based on the documents the witnesses
are tendering before the commission.
Furthermore, he did not understand why
communities that were resettled by the government in the 1960s, given communal
lands and paid compensation for crops destroyed by the Volta River floods could
turn around to claim compensation almost 50 years down the line.
Asetena Mensah Factor
All the witnesses have been telling the commission that Nana Asetena
Mensah (deceased), a leader of the Kantakofure family in Krachi, was the one
who had commissioned Kwadwo Ababio & Co, a consultant and surveyors, to
survey the submerged area out of which the individual plotting were done.
The commission has made it clear that Nana Asetena Mensah never came
forward to make any claims. Rather, he delegated the Krachiwura, who he said
had no stake in the lands, to lead the chase for the compensation.
Consultant & Surveyor
When the Volta Basin claimants formed the group they reportedly agreed
that although 10% valuation fee based
on the total compensation was to be paid to the Surveyor, 60% of the first
tranche compensation payment was rather paid to the Surveyor as consultation
fee.
Yesterday, the commission was expected to enquire
from the Krachiwura about the status of the funds as well as explain how the
funds were disbursed.
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