…..Whilst Soldiers Pick Theirs
DAYBREAK sources within Operation Vanguard and the national security say paltry allowances due police officers picked to serve in the anti-galamsey fight across the country are yet to be paid as promised them by the authorities.
Quiet appeals to the authorities to release funds due the cops have failed as the military fold up and begin processes for handing over fully to the Ghana Police Service in line with new directives from the national security.
Whilst there is funding for the national security project, DAYBREAK learned that the GH¢30 allowances per day due the cops were still outstanding, whilst that of the military had been paid them promptly.
The allowances have been outstanding since December 31.
Operation Vanguard has been in the news lately for all sorts of dubious and corrupt practices, peeved serving officers on the task force leaking information to the media over the peccadilloes of commanding officers.
Morale among officers has therefore been low, culminating in a lackadaisical approach to the all-important exercise and seized equipment running into billions of cedis missing or hidden by hand-picked government operatives.
Of all the state initiatives aimed at sanitizing the system and creating jobs for the teeming Ghanaian youth, the Operation Vanguard has turned out to be most controversial.
In a litany of accusations, one angry, petitioning the government, fingered the military for scuttling the otherwise noble crusade.
Find a copy of the petition below.
PETITION AGAINST AN ILLEGAL DUTY BEING PERFORMED BY MEN ON VANGUARD DUTY 15 BUT NOT VANGUARD OPERATIONAL DUTIES
Sir, I am humbly petitioning your office about an illegal duty that we the men who were deployed by the government of Ghana to stop the illegal mining activities within part of the country.
Since our arrival at the central FOB, Ayanfuri on 30th December, 2019 at 21:00 hours, our leadership been headed by Captain Avorxe, has been detailing the men, mostly police to a guard duty at Perseurs Mining Company, a private entity situated at Ayanfuri. My investigations revealed that the company pays an amount of forty five thousand Ghana cedis every two weeks to the command without the knowledge of the personnel performing such duty and such amount has never been accounted for the government of Ghana. Further investigations revealed that, such money is only pocketed by the commander and his cronies.
Sir, since the duties started from day one, including patrol duties, it has been established that some parts of the central region has been allocated to the commander and some of the senior military officers as a concessions which they don’t allow an arrest to be effected there. Whenever men goes there to perform legally sanctioned duty by the government, the military officers in charge of such term always obstruct men on duty that “O.C instructed that we should not arrest them”. Meaning that such places are for him or he has collected money from the illegal miners. And this has been happening since vanguard fifteen started at the central FOB.
Just behind the camp that houses the men at central FOB, there has been sounds of machines suspected to be that of chanfans-a machine used by illegal miners for mining, so been an investigator, I went to find out and to my outer dismay, I met over hundred people with twenty five chanfans working in an illegal mining pit and when I confronted them, one FiFi who claimed to be their leader informed me that they have been paying an amount of five hundred Ghana cedis per machine, totaling twelve thousand and five five hundred cedis weekly to the commander. I informed my senior officers about it and as at now, the illegal mining is ongoing there, just in the nose of the vanguard personnel been headed by Captain Avorxe who instructed earlier that no personnel should affect any arrest without his instruction, hence the continuation of the illegality as the command has been collecting money from the illegal miners.
Sir, some of us are not comfortable with such happenings as it is tantamount to financial loss to the state and abetment of crime to wit illegal mining so I want to draw this to your attention.
Thanks
DAVID DZOKOTO
Through:
The Officer Commanding
Central FOB
To:
Commanding Officer
Operation Vanguard
Obuasi
Info:
Chairman: Inter Ministerial Committee On Illegal Mining
Jubilee House
