1.11.07

Asantehene Will Attend Head of State's Forum

Otumfuo Osei-Tutu II, Asantehene would leave the country on Thursday November 1, for the Federal Republic of Germany to participate in the third African Forum for Heads of State.

He would be accompanied by Nana Otuo Serebour, Juabenghene for the forum, which takes place between 2nd and 4th November at Kloster Eberbach Monastery Conference Centre, in the State of Hesse in Germany.

In a press release issued on Monday from the Manhyia Palace and signed by Mr G.B. Osei-Antwi, Media Relations Manager, Otumfuo would address the forum on Traditions and Modernity. The forum, which would bring together top politicians, businessmen and members of civil society organisations has the theme "Pushing Forward into the 21st Century, The World State of Flux: Answers from Africa and Germany."
Source:GNA

Ghana-Fuel Prices Shoot Up

Prices of fuel in Ghana have shot up after recent upsurge in the prices of crude oil on the world market.The indicative maximum price of premium petrol is now up by 4.11% to 97.78 pesewas per litre from 93.92 pesewas per litter quoted last month.Kerosene also shot up by 8.76% from 79.38 pesewas per litre to 86.25pesewas per litre.However, the indicative maximum price of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) shot up significantly by 20.72% from 81.10 pesewas per GHp/Kg to 97.90 pesewas GHp/Kg which may be due to taxi drivers powering their engines with LPG.
The price of gasoline was not spared the shakeup as it also increased by 5.35% from 90.44 pesewas to 95.28 pesewas per litre.The indicative maximum price is a price beyond which an Oil Market Company (OMC) in Ghana is not allowed to sell petroleum products.It could be recalled that Oil prices, traded near a record high of US$93 a barrel and threatens an all time hit of US$100 if political tension and speculation continue in the Middle East, the hub of the oil industry.
Oil hit an all-time high of US$93.07 a barrel yesterday, because of the violence between Turkish soldiers and Kurdish guerrillas and a record low of the US dollar.According to officials from the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), oil has risen for reason unrelated to supply and demand and that there is little the exporter group can do to lower price.OPEC is set to raise oil output by 500,000 barrels per day from November 11-18, 2007 in Riyadh for their third Heads of State Summit, an event that is usually a talking shop that makes no decision on supply policy.
Reasons adduced to the increases, according to the Public Relations Officer (PRO) of the NPA, Mr. Steve Larbi are not far fetched from the indicators on the futures market.The National Petroleum Authority ACT 691 was enacted by the Parliament of the Republic of Ghana to regulate, oversee and monitor activities in the petroleum downstream industry; to establish a Unified Petroleum Price Fund; and to provide for related purposes.
Source:Ghanaian Chronicle

Money can’t influence delegates---Frimpong-Boateng

A presidential aspirant of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Professor Kwabena Frimpong-Boateng, has stated that delegates to the congress to elect the party's flag bearer will not base their choice on monetary inducements. "The delegates are listening and comparing what we (the aspirants) say with what we have done and can do for the country and party," he said.
Speaking in an interview in Accra, Prof. Frimpong-Boateng said anybody who claimed he was on top must be joking. According to him, from his interaction with members of the party throughout the country, it was evident that the members had been disappointed and therefore want someone they could trust, someone who would help them build their future. "They tell you no one can buy their conscience and they also know that it is God who establishes kings and will be using them to elect the flag bearer of the party," he added.
Prof. Frimpong-Boateng said he was happy with what was taking place on the ground, stressing that "I am doing very well. I am in to win and will win with God's help." When asked to comment on the results of opinion polls being conducted on supposed leading candidates, he said, the pollsters were "Whistling in the dark". "I believe they are scared and want to put up an appearance of being brave," he stated. According to him, opinion polls are very expensive to conduct and that if one knows the source of funding for the opinion polls, one could predict the outcome. As to why his campaign message has centred on science and technology, Prof. Frimpong-Boateng says everything in nature revolves around science and that until Ghana adopts science and technology, "We cannot survive."
He said science is the factor accounting for the difference between developing countries and the developed ones and that the poverty gap is essentially a technological gap. He added that during the recent devastating floods in the country, it took the assistance of French helicopters to reach inaccessible areas. Prof. Frimpong-Boateng adds that to do anything in education, health, agriculture, environmental sanitation, water resources, renewable energy, among others, technology is required. He says because the country does not have the technological know-how, its imports far outstrip its exports, adding that although the country is endowed with abundant natural resources, those resources are exported in their raw form for far less the value if the country were to refine them.
Prof. Frimpong-Boateng vigorously asserts that science and technology is needed to teach history and archaeology also. "We pride ourselves as a football nation and yet we cannot even-manufacture a football,” he lamented. Prof. Frimpong-Boateng said it was because of the science and technological gap that he had decided to champion it when elected flag bearer and later as President of the Republic of Ghana. According to him, eight years as President of Ghana would be enough to do many things to chart a new path for Ghana's development."We can develop a machine tool centre within a year, start manufacturing small machine parts and develop the capacity to make implements," he added.
Prof. Frimpong-Boateng says it is regrettable that $2.5 million worth of bolts and nuts are imported into the country every year besides other machine parts. "I promise that within four years we should be building pick-ups. We should be able to produce spare parts for other countries," he pledged. "I just don't talk about it, I do it. Right now, I produce my own 'bio-diesel to fuel my vehicles and I have a machine tool centre at the Free Zones and my work as a heart surgeon, which is high-tech, will propel me on to do greater things for Ghana and Ghanaians," he declared, Source: Daily Graphic

GCPP is not a political party - IEA

"GCPP does not qualify as a party to be funded because it has no representative in Parliament and also all efforts by IEA to know where GCPP's offices are located in the country over the years had proved futile." The Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) has said.The IEA described as baseless the claims by the Great Consolidated Popular Party (GCPP) that the institute is using foreign funds to promote four leading political parties in the country.
The IEA said GCPP was crying foul out of frustration since its allegations against the institute held no water. The GCPP, in a statement issued last week and signed by the General Secretary, John Thompson, described the IEA as a think-tank that was running a parallel Inter-Party Advisory Committee (IPAC) with the four leading parties to decide for the rest of the political parties, adding that the act was undermining democracy.
"lEA is a neo-colonialist organization whose activities should be critically examined by the government," the statement maintained. The party claimed that the monies being used in assisting the parties were coming from a Dutch organization, the Netherlands Institute for Multi Party Democracy (NIMD). According to Mr. Thompson, this action of the IEA was making the political playing field in the country uneven, and also described the IEA as a body which used illegal means to fund four parties to the detriment of others.
Speaking to DAILY GUIDE in reaction to the accusations, however, a source close to the IEA stressed that before a political party could qualify for funding by any entity, it had to have at least one or two representatives in the nation's House of Parliament. It said despite IEA's advice to the leaders of GCPP to fight for Parliamentary seats to enable it to get equal support from various funding bodies as other parties were getting, GCPP remained adamant.
The source stated that IEA did not see why parties' capacities should not be built to help enhance the nation's democracy, stressing that the laws of the land prohibited direct funding of political parties from foreign bodies but did not prevent indirect funding. It emphasized that the IEA, through various measures, had ensured over the years that political parties including the GCPP were educated in all their political endeavours to ensure political and democratic stability in the country.Source: Daily Guide

Ghana is back on track with investment opportunities - Veep woos foreign investors

Accra, June 6, GNA-Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia says Ghana's economic opportunities for private sector investors are back on track as...