Obuasi undertakes infrastructural devt
The Obuasi Municipal Chief Executive (MCE) Officer, Mr Richard Ofori Agyeman Boadi, has received commendation for his aggressive development initiatives that have seen areas, which hitherto were unattractive and dangerous, transformed into pleasant neighbourhoods.
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Projects
There are about 11 major projects, including the construction of a new Divisional Police Headquarters for Obuasi, which are currently ongoing.
The Ashanti Regional Minister, Mr Samuel Sarpong, was appreciative of the MCE’s unyielding spirit in the face of daunting challenges and called for support from the community and assembly members to ensure that Mr Boadi’s dream for the municipality was achieved.
The construction of the modern police station for Obuasi is expected to cost about GH¢780,000 and would be completed in two years. The project, which is currently at the foundation stage, is being funded from internally generated funds. On completion, the facility would have both male and female cells.
Also under construction is a light industrial centre for artisans. The centre, located at Baakoyedeen, a suburb of Obuasi, would cost GH¢521,000. When the project is completed, all artisans in Obuasi and its environs would be made to relocate to the new site.
The new light industrial area will facilitate efforts by retrenched staff members of AngloGold who are interested in dealing in auto products.
Already, consultative meetings between the assembly and auto mechanics are on-going for them to fully train and support those retrenched workers from AngloGold.
Other projects being undertaken in Obuasi include a 1.3 km road estimated to cost about GH¢150,000, a transport terminal and a market complex estimate at about GH¢4.5 million.
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The construction of the transport terminal and market complex, which started in January this year, will take two years to complete. The first of the four-phased project is scheduled to be ready by December this year.
The Fourth Ordinary Session
After touring the project sites, the Regional Minister, Mr Sarpong, opened the Second Ordinary Meeting of the Fourth Session of the Obuasi Municipal Assembly. He touched on a wide-range of issues, including sanitation.
He also mentioned the street-naming and property addressing system which was expected to end by next month.
President’s directive
The Regional Minister expressed regret that in spite of President John Dramani Mahama’s charge to various metropolitan, municipal and districts assemblies to complete the street-naming and property addresses by next month, most assemblies were still lagging behind because of some challenges. He urged them to nonetheless speed up the processes.
Evaluate NHIA
In another development, following the outbreak of the deadly Ebola disease and other communicable diseases in parts of the West African sub-region , the Chairman of the Ghana Medical Association, Dr Opoku Adusei, has called for an appraisal of the National Health Insurance (NHI) policy to enable it to capture such diseases.
He said the policy was one of the good plans the country had had since independence, but noted also that it still needed some amendments, inclusions and a participatory approach, particularly with clients, to improve it and make it more sustainable.
Dr Adusei was addressing this year’s mid-year review meeting of heads of various district health insurance offices in the Ashanti Region. The meeting was attended by over 50 delegates. He said with the introduction of biometric registration of members, it should be possible for one to access health care without necessarily presenting the national health insurance card.
“The NHIS must not die, everything possible must be done to improve the scheme and sustain it,’’ he told the about 50 delegates in Kumasi last Friday.
The Head of the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) in the Ashanti Region, Mr Daniel Acheampong Frempong, who said he agreed with Dr Opoku, also promised that his outfit would send out a proposal to the head office in Accra for Ebola and other deadly diseases to be factored into the policy.
The NHIS biometric registration exercise is progressing successfully and steadily in the Ashanti Region. So far, an amount of GH¢3 million has been generated from premium payments.
The Ashanti Region currently has 116 machines in operation and has issued over 88,940 cards and paid over GH¢43 million as claims.
According to Mr Frempong, the region had plans to undertake regular meetings with stakeholders in an effort to make it one of the best examples as far as the implementation of the NHI policy was concerned.
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