LOTTO RECEIVERS DEMONSTRATE AGAINST NLA

HUNDREDS of lotto receivers, agents and marketers on Thursday took to the streets of Accra in protest against the National Lottery Authority (NLA) for reducing their commission from 25 to 20 per cent.

The protest, organised by the National Lotto Receivers Union (NLRU), followed the breakdown in negotiations between the union and the authority which has been protracted for several months.

The NLRU, in July this year, declared a nationwide strike to press home its demands on the percentage reduction.

They carried placards with inscriptions such as “Government must listen to lotto receivers”, “Government must act now in the interest of better Ghana”, and “Kojo Andah, after collapsing Ghana Airways and Ashanti Goldfields, is now supervising a virtual collapse of NLA”.

The demonstrators, who marched through some principal streets of Accra, also called for the removal of the Director-General of the NLA, Mr Kojo Andah, and the entire board of directors for what they described as attempts to run down the lotto industry.

The three-hour demonstration, led by the National Chairman of the NLRU, Mr Daniel Mensah, and other executives, saw some regional executives from the Eastern, Volta and Central regions participating.

Among other things, the union sought government’s assistance to coerce the NLA management to stop the undue delay in the payment of winnings to the general public which had seen members of the public looking on receivers with contempt.

Similarly, the leadership said the new PADPM machines introduced by the NLA as a way of phasing out the manual system of lotto writing had worsened the plight of members, as the machines, apart from the unreasonable monthly deductions made on their GPRS account which were never refunded, also experienced daily network breakdowns, particularly at weekends when the lotto business reached its peak.

The situation, they said, had seen members posting huge losses.

They also accused the NLA of disclaiming the NLRU, while compelling newly applied receivers to sign an undertaking to accept lower commissions.

At the Finance Ministry, where the leadership of the NLRU presented a petition to the Finance Minister, which was received by the Chief Director of the ministry, Mr Enoch Cobbinah, the National Secretary of the union, Mr Kofi Frimpong, told officials that the NLA had imported some 10,000 substandard lottery terminals through sole sourcing, in contravention of the Public Procurement Law, at a cost of eight million euros and tasked officials to investigate the claims and bring to book the director-general and his operations manager.

The machines, which he described as irreparable, had ceased to function since October this year, a few months after they had been imported.

He further said the NLA management, in an attempt to break the front of the union, had disconnected electricity supply to the union offices and locked up lavatories, thereby forcing members of both sexes to resort to the use of a cabin plastic mobile lavatory.

The action, he said, came on the heels of the NLA’s recent claims that it had no symbolic labour relationship with the NLRU, despite the union having been certified and licensed as a lotto marketing company (LMC) and making it the biggest marketer of the NLA’s products.

The protestors later converged on the Efua Sutherland Children’s Park, where a Deputy Chief of Staff, Mr Alex Segbefia, received their petition on behalf of the government.

He told the demonstrators that since the protest had been carried out on a legitimate basis, the government would, as a matter of urgency, take appropriate actions to resolve the impasse between the NLA and the NLRU.

He urged the leadership of the union to exercise restraint while the government addressed its concerns.

SOURCE: Della Russel Ocloo, Daily Graphic, Fri Dec 2, 2011