A group of 2006 dismissed workers from the Ghana Railway Corporation has filed an injunction on the accounts of the company due to its failure to settle their arrears for over 17 years.
Chairman of the retrenched workers, John Kojo Appiah, noted that they resorted to this measure after their attempts to recover their long-overdue funds proved unsuccessful.
The injunction granted by the Sekondi High Court serves as a means to ensure that the Ghana Railway addresses the outstanding payments owed to the retrenched workers, who have been waiting for compensation for nearly two decades.
“The Cape Coast Appeals Court ordered the payment of our money in 2015. Since then, the company has refused to pay the money to us and all efforts have proven unsuccessful. Our lawyer led us and an injunction has been placed on the accounts where salaries of workers are paid from,” he indicated.
Out of the 674 retrenched workers, 111 have died and the rest are above fifty years. Most of them are currently battling one sickness after the other.
Secretary of the retrenched workers, 76-year-old Edward Roberts is blaming the Western Regional Minister, Kwabena Otchere Darko-Mensah, Former Railways Minister, Joe Ghartey, and John Peter Amewu, for refusing to act.
“We have informed all of them about our plight, they are all aware of the Court ruling but have failed to act. I’m 74 years and very sick, I don’t even have money to buy drugs but they are refusing to pay us. Most of our members have died and the rest of us are very sick,” he added.
With the assistance of their lawyer, Joseph Abakah, an injunction has been secured on the Ghana Commercial Bank Account of the Company in Takoradi, Kumasi, and Accra.
According to them, the company currently owes them GH₵56 million and until their money is paid, the workers cannot receive their salaries.
Member of parliament for the Jomoro Constituency in the Western Region, Dorcas Affo-Toffey, has detailed how the two years of court proceedings regarding her nationality have had an impact on the residents and development of her district.
The MP said some investors she contacted refused to come and invest in Jomoro because she was in court in the first two years of her tenure.
Madam Affo-Toffey gave these explanations in an interview on Onua FM’s drive time show Efie Ne Fie with Dr. Prekese on Thursday, March 30, 2023.
The Sekondi High Court in November 2022 dismissed a petition that sought to challenge the eligibility of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) Member of Parliament (MP).
That meant Dorcas Affo-Toffey could continue to be an MP and continue to represent the people of Jomoro in Parliament.
The court said per her application and subsequent issuance of a Ghanaian passport, she automatically lost the Ivorian nationality.
The court held that per Ivorian laws, immediately the MP acquired a Ghanaian passport, she automatically ceased to be an Ivorian and therefore there was no need for her to have formally renounced her Ivorian citizenship as argued by the petitioners.
Reacting to the issue, Madam Affo-Toffey explained that Jomoro can boast of several natural resources that when utilized, can create several employment opportunities not only for the people in Jomoro Constituency, but also the entire country, yet poverty is rampant.
“My constituency has two different areas. The coastal area and farming area and we are blessed as constituency. We have oil, cocoa, coconut, rubber, cassava and others but we have bad roads in some areas, bad telecommunication networks which I have been able to solve – unemployment and electricity challenges in some small towns,” she explained.
The MP added that “on schools, we have just two SHSs, one was built by Nkrumah and the one was done during NDC era. Some communities were cut off from the rest…but we get cocoa from there. They carry sick people on a stretch”.
She explained that due to the nature of poverty in the area, she started contacting some investors in the US for them to come and create jobs in Jomoro but these investors did not come because of the court case.
“I travelled to the US and met two huge companies who were willing to come and invest in Jomoro but they said, we are coming because of you and you are in court so we cannot come. So the court petition did not help me at all. It did not help me and my people. They would have done a factory for both coconut and cassava processing. The frustrations were too much but I am not perturbed and discouraged”.
Madam Affo-Toffey said “you are in Parliament but you do not know what will happen next. The court for two years did not help the development of me and my people”.
Commenting on her achievements despite the court petition which delayed development, the MP said “every witch is afraid of me because my people pray for me always because of what I have been able to do for them in these few years despite the court petition”.
“I have given over 350 SHSs students educational material such as mattresses.I have given over 200 tertiary students scholarship to study, I have built CHPS compound for some communities, I supplied pharmaceuticals to clinics, hospital and CHPS compounds, I have done over 600 desks to school….My target is to do over 2,000. I have the carpenters who manufacture them in the constituency. On water project, there were schools that pupils walk kilometres to drink water and return to school. I have provided them with potable water. My target is to do something for every community. I have decided to do the rest by the end of the year”.
Madam Affo-Toffey added that “I am building a 6-unit classroom block for one of the communities. I have done a bridge …three of those bridges…but the one in a place called Mitica is the best because since the inception of the town, no one has been able to go there with a car but I have done it. I don’t think even if my common fund for four terms cannot pay that for the Mitica Bridge but I have done them all”.
An election petition case against the Member of Parliament for the Jomoro constituency, Dorcas Affo-Toffey, has been struck out by the Sekondi High Court.
This comes after a citizen, Joshua Emuah Kofie, went to court to challenge the eligibility of the MP to contest as a representative of the people in the constituency on the ticket of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) on grounds that she had multiple nationalities, including American and Ivorian citizenships, which is against the 1992 Constitution.
The Sekondi High Court presided over by Justice Dr. Richmond Osei Hwere dismissed the case on grounds that the MP was eligible to contest as she lost her Ivorian citizenship at the very time, she acquired her Ghanaian citizenship.
In regards to her American citizenship, the MP denied having American citizenship.
The case has been in court for over 20 months since she was elected to represent the people of Jomoro constituency.
An election petition case against the Member of Parliament for the Jomoro constituency, Dorcas Affo-Toffey, has been struck out by the Sekondi high court.
This comes after a citizen, Joshua Emuah Kofie, went to court to challenge the eligibility of the MP to contest as a representative of the people in the constituency on the ticket of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) on grounds that she had multiple nationalities, including American and Ivorian citizenships, which is against the 1992 Constitution.
The Sekondi High Court presided over by Justice Dr. Richmond Osei Hwere dismissed the case on grounds that the MP was eligible to contest as she lost her Ivorian citizenship at the very time, she acquired her Ghanaian citizenship.
In regards to her American citizenship, the MP denied having American citizenship.
The case has been in court for over 20 months since she was elected to represent the people of Jomoro constituency.
The Commercial Division of the Sekondi High Court, presided over by Justice Sedina Agbemava has ruled that the late 53-year-old taxi driver in Fijai, Joseph Entsie, who died in police custody, was killed by police officers.
The late taxi driver at the Fijai Taxi Rank in Sekondi had been arrested on 25th December, 2021 for alleged drunk driving and hitting some policemen at the Effia Nkwanta Nurses Quarters police checkpoint with his car.
He was then sent to the Sekondi Police Station and placed in a cell.
The Western Region Police Command, in a report, had stated that Joseph Entsie was later found dead in his cell with his jeans trousers tied to his neck, suggesting suicide.
But the pathologist who performed an autopsy on him had informed the family he did not die by hanging.
The police then asked for another autopsy from a different pathologist but refused to disclose the results to the family because they [the family] had refused to be present for the second autopsy.
With the help of a lawyer from Legal Aid Commission, Mr. Ebo Donkor, the case was sent to court.
Delivering the ruling, Justice Sedinam Avernogbo directed the Attorney General to prosecute the police officers involved.
The opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) Member of Parliament for Jomoro, Dorcas Affo-Toffey, was the subject of an intense cross-examination at the Sekondi High Court on Monday, October 10, 2022.
The MP, whose citizenship at the time of filing her nomination for parliamentary election is being challenged in court, was subjected to questioning over documents of her Ivorian citizenship renunciation presented to the court.
Counsel for the petitioner in the case, Bright Agyekum, sought to present to the court that the MP’s attempt to allude to the documents renouncing her Ivorian citizenship is nothing less than an afterthought.
Challenging the MP’s testimony, Mr Agyekum argued that the documents of renunciation alluded to by Dorcas Affo-Toffey did not exist before the commencement of the trial against her.
The lawyer for the petitioner referenced a letter dated January 24, 2019, in which the MP wrote to the Attorney General of Ivory Coast that she was renouncing her citizenship.
The lawyer further mentioned another letter dated January 29, 2019, in which the Ivorian Attorney General’s Office acknowledged receipt of the letter issued by the Jomoro MP on January 24, 2019.
“I am putting it to you that both letters were complete afterthoughts,” Mr. Agyekum is quoted in a report by Dailyguidenetwork.com in his argument that Affo-Toffey did not qualify to run for the Jomoro seat as MP in 2020.
The petitioner’s lawyer also questioned Dorcas Affo-Toffey on why she had to remind the Ivorian authorities in March and April 2021 about her intention to renounce her citizenship way back in 2019.
The defendant, in response, said she was minded to do so because of the case in court.
“So the Ivorian authorities issued you with an attestation on April 12, 2021,” the petitioner’s lawyer further questioned, to which the MP responded in the affirmative.
Bright Agyekum further said that the stamp appearing on the documents attached to her witness statement was not an original one emanating from the Ivorian Justice Ministry, but the MP disagreed with the assertion.
In her case, Madam Affo-Toffey alluded that her Ivorian citizenship renunciation was automatically effected by her showing of interest in doing so. This, she said, was provided for in Article 48 of the Ivorian Nationality Code.
But the petitioner’s lawyer, during his cross-examination of the MP, suggested that the provisions she alluded to do not cover her.
“I cannot answer. I will leave it with my lawyer to answer that question,” she responded.
Background
A resident of the Jomoro Constituency, Emuah Kofie Nuba-Mpataba, in 2021 filed a suit accusing Dorcas Affo-Toffey of not being a Ghanaian citizen at the time of filing her parliamentary contest nomination.
According to the petitioner, the NDC MP, by the provision of Ghana’s electoral laws, was not qualified to contest in the 2020 parliamentary election because she held dual citizenship.
