Krachi West Assembly Gears up for Development

By Stephen Kwabena Effah
Tuesday,11 July 2006 (Page 15)

The Krachi West District Assembly in the Volta Region has set up four committees to assist in stepping up the development of the district.

The committees, which are agriculture and aqua –culture, tourism, transport and education will serve as a pressure group to lobby ministries and agencies to bring developmental projects to the district as a means of ensuring accelerated growth.

Inaugurating the committees in Accra at the weekend, the District Chief Executive, Kofi Mensah Demitia said that although the district is endowed with resources, it is faced with the a lot of problems which are mainly general infrastructure.

He mentioned the road network, potable water, sanitation, and schools as the areas that need serious attention.

He said that assembly is to train 60 secondary school graduates in the district as health aides to scale-up the shortfall of health professionals in the various health facilities in the area noting that a total of 13 health aides have been trained so far and posted
to the clinics and health posts in the district.

Mr.Demitia explained that the assembly is expected to spend about ¢210 million for the training of the health aides adding “we will spend about ¢3.5 million cedis on each of these health aides”.

He indicated that the health aides programme would be developed further by the assembly with time, noting that some of the aides would be enrolled in nursing training schools for them to become fully fledged nurses to serve the district.
He noted that the capitation grant introduced by the government in basic education has increased enrolment by 170 per cent, resulting in over population of classrooms in the district.

He said the district does not have enough trained teachers, noting “we received only 40 trained teachers this academic year and also almost the same number of old teachers in the district have left to further their education while some have also been transferred from the district”.

Currently, he said that “we have 270 classrooms without teachers”.

The D.C.E, however said the assembly has decided to recruit pupil teachers for a four-week modular training to acquire teaching skills after which they would be sent to the various schools to fill the lapses.

He urged the citizens of the districts who are in the various universities and colleges in the country to go to the district to assist in the teaching field whenever they are on vacation or practical attachment, stressing that the assembly would do all within its power to assist such people.

Mr.Demitia also indicated that the government has started a farming project in the district under the Skills Training and Employment Placement which he said would engage about 350 youth in the area.

He therefore urged the youth in the district to take advantage of all these opportunities existing in the area to make a better life for themselves rather than engaging in unnecessary things.

He also announced that the assembly is planning to establish a rural bank in the district to offer loans to small scale business to ensure accelerated growth in the area. He said the assembly is preparing the necessary document to be presented to the Bank of Ghana for approval.

He observed that a lot of funds and resources for small scale businesses are channeled through rural banks and therefore the establishment of a rural bank for Kete Krachi would make it easier for business minded people to access the funds and also ensure better living of the people.

Mr.Demitia expressed the hope that the Bank of Ghana approves the establishment of the rural bank when the proposal is submitted to it.