A member of the Gender and Children Committee of Parliament, Naa Odoley Sowah has told President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to appoint a new Minister for the Ministry of Gender and Children Affairs
The Dedekotopon Member of Parliament told Alfred Ocansey on 3FM Sunrise Morning Show on Thursday April 7 that very important social policies and programmes of government have been badly affected by the absence of the substantive Minister Sarah Adwoa Safo who has been on leave.
She also noted that the budget allocation to the Gender Ministry is woefully inadequate and expect government to pay critical attention to it.
The legislator disclosed that the Social Welfare Department of the Local Assemblies are not able to function effectively because of financial constraints.
There are a lot of negative effects of the absence of the Minister of Gender on very important policies and programs of the ministry such as the School Feeding Program.
“Caterers of the School Feeding Program are not able to provide quality food for the students due to unnecessary delays in payment to them by government” she stressed.
She observed that “the caretaker minister has her hands full and finding it difficult to focus on the Gender Ministry. I believe the president could have made the Deputy Minister the substantive minister.”
Naa Odoley laments “Government assured us that persons with disabilities were going to be employed to manage the toll booths; but after the hastened closure of the toll booths by the Minister of Roads, nothing has been done for the affected persons.
“The Gender Ministry is a very sensitive area so for the President not to have mentioned anything about that ministry during his State of the Nation Address is very worrying and I expect the Vice President Dr Mahamudu Bawumia to clarify things about that in his presentation on the economy scheduled for Thursday afternoon” she told 3FM.
