Youth in afforestation will be paid by close of June - Forestry Commission

The Chief Executive Officer of the Forestry Commission, John Owusu Afriyie has said the salaries owed the beneficiaries of the Youth Afforestation Programme will be paid by close of June 2019.

In March, some beneficiaries of the programme staged a demonstration over the delays in the payment of allowances due them.

Speaking to Citi News on the sidelines of a presentation of Mole National Park Wildlife Census Results, the CEO of the commission said the allowances will be paid soon.

“I do not want to preempt the outcome of the meeting that I had with the Ministry but few days ahead of us, they know we deliver when we promise so let us wait and see what happens. Today is 20th so I hope by the end of June this year, we will have some money to pay the arrears and I believe that we will get it because we are still pushing for supplements.

Unfortunately for us, our programme did not have a budget so when the programme began, we hoped to rectify that and that is what we are doing in spite of the fact that we do not have a budget, the Ministry and the government continue to support us.”

Beneficiaries of the program have on several occasions threatened to protest demonstrate over the non-payment of allowances.

Last year, some of them in the Eastern Region threatened to embark on series of demonstrations over the non-payment of allowances and poor working conditions.

Prior to that, several others in the Greater Accra and other areas had also protested the non-payment of allowances.

Be patient, we’ll pay you – Sir John tells Youth in Afforestation

At the time, Chief Executive Mr. Owusu Afriyie called on beneficiaries to exercise patience.

With several assurances, he said the Commission was working to have the monies paid as soon as possible.

Kwadwo Owusu Afriyie, popularly known as Sir John, in a Citi News interview, said some of the beneficiaries had enrolled on other government youth intervention programs and were receiving double allowances, and so his outfit has expunged their names from the Commission’s register.

“There are some of them who have enrolled on other programs and our records have captured their names as being on two or several platforms and therefore we have also expunged their names from our records. So there are several cogent reasons why some of them may not have received their allowances, but to the broader majority of the people whose records are okay, we have paid everybody up to July.”

In October 2018, the Chief Executive Officer of the Forestry Commission, Kwadwo Owusu Afriyie gave assurances that the beneficiaries will be paid in the following week.

But the workers said they wanted full payment of their arrears.

 

Source: citifmonline.com