Common Fund impasse: Naa Torshie is not answerable to you – Minority to Dan Botwe

The Deputy Minority Whip, Ibrahim Ahmed has accused Local Government Rural Development and Decentralisation Minister, Dan Botwe of kicking above his weight in the impasse with Common Fund administrator Irene Naa Torshie.

The Minister has written to President Akufo-Addo to complain about the failure of the administrator to collaborate with his Ministry in the discharge of her duties.

The Minister explains all attempts to get Naa Torshie to report to him for the past two and half years have proven futile.

But speaking to Starr News the MP for Banda and a member of the Local Government Committee, Ibrahim Ahmed argued that the Act which gave the Minister supervisory powers over the Common Fund Administrator was amended in 2016 under the Local Government Act 936.

The amendment made the administrator only answerable to parliament and the president.

According to him, the fight between the minister and the administrator is needless since the law is clear Dan Botwe is out of line.

“As a matter of fact, there is no controversy at all and this should not be a controversy. Judging from the fact that the two personalities involved together with my good self were in the Parliament of the Republic of Ghana when we all changed the law. And the reporting and responsibility of the administrator from the Minister, the Presidency and Parliament.

“So I don’t understand the hullabaloo about what is happening. The Local Government Act 455 was passed in Parliament in 1993 which says that the administrator for the Common Fund should report to the Minister of Local Government. Then in 2016 the Local Government Act 1993, Act 455 Parliament changed it that the administrator for District Assembly Common Fund should now report to Parliament and the President,” the Banda lawmaker stated.