The Assembly Members of Berekum West District Assembly failed to confirm Mr Martin Obeng Adjei to become the first District Chief Executive (DCE) for the newly created District.
The Berekum West District Assembly, which was carved from the Berekum Municipal Assembly in March this year, has been running without DCE for the past 4 months.
The nomination of the DCE comes after four months after the inauguration of the Berekum West District Assembly, which was held on the 15 of March 2018. In a letter signed and released on 18 July 2018 by the Honorable Minister of the Local government, Hajia Alima Mahama, Mr. Marthin Obeng Adjei was among over 25 persons nominated by the President to be voted on by the various assemblies.
The endorsement vote or otherwise took place yesterday 27th, July 2018 at Jinijini at the District Assembly’s office. Twenty-seven members of the assembly voted under the organization of the electoral commission. After the counts of the votes, 12 members were for Mr. Obeng Adjei and 15 voted against him. However, in order to be deemed confirmed, he needed to get two thirds of the total votes cast, which is 18 members. Thus, this deemed him not confirmed. Since he could not manage to get at least a half of the votes, the electoral commission cannot organize a re-vote, thus a new nomination or re-nomination has to come from the president again.
The failure of the Assembly Members to vote the retired teacher who hails from Koraso and a former Berekum Municipal deputy director of education for DCE attracted the fury of some youth of the Berekum West District, which had to be intervened by the police present.
There were widespread speculations that each of the assembly members had pocketed Gh2000.00 which infuriated some of the youth and thus questioned why the members refused to vote for the man after collecting the money.
The Brong Ahafo Regional Minister Hon. Asomah Kyere who also hails from the district was very surprised and questioned why the man did not get the required votes for his confirmation.
The District is in waiting to hear whom the president will present again.
Story by
Opamago Papa Richy of Akomapa FM
