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The Cape Coast Metropolitan Assembly (CCMA) has shut down the Central Regional Offices of the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) and Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT), for non-payment of property rates and business operating permits.
ECG and SSNIT have not complied with payments since 2021 and 2022 respectively, to the tune of GHc140,000.00.
For ECG, the CCMA-led-taskforce first locked up the prepared vending outlets, fault checking area, the warehouse, and the main administrative block being occupied by various managers.
At the SSNIT office, the task force drove all occupants out and locked the facility hosting other institutions such as New Times Corporation, Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ) Star Life Insurance, and others.
The exercise affected scores of clients of the two institutions who gathered in their numbers to perform various tasks and services including the purchase of prepaid.
Property rate is the amount charged by Metropolitan, Municipal, and District Assemblies (MMDAs) on the immovable property each year. It is calculated by the product of the value of a property and the percentage rate charged on a property’s value.
Article 245 of the 1992 Constitution prescribed the functions of district assemblies to include the collection of taxes, rates, duties, and fees for the provision of basic services, such as the construction and maintenance of streets, storm drainage structures, recreational facilities, and libraries.
Briefing the media after the exercise, Mr. Jonathan Yeboah, the Metro Finance Officer who led the team, said they took the move after all efforts to encourage the two institutions to pay proved futile.
“We are not happy with our action today, but we are left with no option after several communications to remind them of the need to pay for work were unsuccessful.
“If they had come to the Assembly as we requested and properly engaged us, this would not have happened because we do not take delight in such things,” Mr. Yeboah stated.
The Metro Finance Officer expressed the Assembly’s determination to employ all legal means to claim all arrears owed to the assembly by institutions in the Metropolis to rake in the needed revenue to implement development projects.
To this end, he told other institutions owing the Assembly to engage to institute payment plans that would ensure good faith, and noted that the Assembly had ceded its property rates collection from January 2023 to the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA).
Nonetheless, some officials of the two institutions on anonymity expressed worry over the exercise, saying it affected their operations as many customers were left stranded.
At the ECG office, an official who appeared furious about the conduct shouted at the top of his voice that the exercise was unprofessional and wrong on the side of the assembly.
“This operation is needless and unprofessionally done”, the official said and questioned the motive behind locking up ECG offices as early as 07:00 hours.
At the SSNIT office, staff of all institutions with offices in the building who had reported to work were dragged out and locked out.
A staff who claimed to be an Accounts officer challenged the team that his outfit had paid all monies expected of them and was confused about the operation.
“We have been embarrassed, disgraced, and dragged out of our offices over non-payment of permits and rates.
“I know the property rate has been paid to an account, but we have been asked by the assembly to transfer into another account, so I am confused about the exercise,” the official said.
