THE Eastern Regional co-ordinator of the National Youth Employment Programme (NYEP), Joshua Atta Mensah has been accused by his own party people of using his office to amass wealth since he took office 17 months ago.
The party people, who Mr. Mensah accused of planning to scuttle his parliamentary ambitions, have gone to the extent of posting about 10 allegations of impropriety including an amount of GH¢10,000 he had allegedly pocketed from the sale of oil and gas forms and also ‘chopping’ an amount of GH¢5,000 meant for his district co-ordinators when the national co-ordinator inaugurated the ‘Youth in Mining’ module in the region.
He was also accused of building a four-bedroom house at Oyoko in the New Juaben municipality after assuming office 17 months ago.
According to members of the party, he allegedly took custody of some video cameras meant for beneficiaries of ‘youth in film industry’ module on the flimsy charges that the beneficiaries refused to take part in the recent photo ID exercise and later lied that the said cameras are with a certain man in Accra. “He has taken over the job of the New Juaben municipal co-ordinator as registration forms for applicants were sold at GH¢ 30 through one Apasaare,” his own party people alleged.
The party people also alleged that he has a bought a Honda car and cunningly registered it in the name of a friend. Some beneficiaries of the NYEP, Daily Guide learnt, have also petitioned the regional headquarters of the party to investigate allegations that the regional co-ordinator took monies before considering them for the NYEP programme.
When contacted by the Daily Guide, Joshua Atta Mensah denied all the allegations but confirmed that he was putting up a building at Oyoko and also receiving GH¢5,000 from the national office of the NYEP as imprest for the running of the regional office of the NYEP.“It is true that I am putting up a building at Oyoko but I did not start the building when I assumed office.
The building in question is a two-bedroom house and not four-bedroom house as being alleged and I started the building before NDC came into power,” he said, adding that he was a sub-contractor and as such was better-off before the NDC came to power.
He pointed out that he used his income from his contract to start his building. According to him, when the NDC was in opposition he contested for the New Juaben North NDC parliamentary seat, paid for the nomination fee of GH¢1,000 and financed all his campaign activities without the support of the party.
He told the Daily Guide that when the party was in opposition, he single-handedly defended the party on many radio stations in the Eastern Region and had to travel almost every day to Nkawkaw and Accra to defend that party on ‘Obuoba’ FM and ‘Radio Gold’ using his own money for that work.
According to him, he knows those people behind the malicious allegations, who according to him, are bent on preventing him from contesting in the party’s primaries in New Juaben but that will never deter him. “I definitely contest in the primaries in New Juaben and these things cannot intimidate me,” he said. He said he had reported the matter to the police and the head of security in the region for them to investigate the allegations and if they happen to be true he was ready to sacrifice his job.
Source: D-Guide
