Ghana National Council

According to the farmers, they would not accept any further excuses from the government over their monies since it (the government) was allegedly playing tribal politics with the matter.

Speaking in an interview with The Chronicle in Sunyani, the farmers maintained that all cocoa farmers in the Ashanti Region had been duly paid with all their outstanding and current debts to the neglect of those in the Brong Ahafo and Western Regions, who, according to them, produced cocoa in larger quantities.

"In fact we are not happy with the government at all, because we have families and children. Even to put aside the Christmas, which we did not get money to celebrate as we wanted to, we still need money to pay our children's school fees.

How can we suffer in the bush for the whole year and when it is time for us to enjoy, we go and borrow monies from somewhere.

Initially we thought it was just going to be a short term issue, but it seems the government is taking us for a ride; so if it fails to come out within a short possible time to explain, we will also advise ourselves," they complained and threatened.

All efforts by The Chronicle to get the Brong Ahafo Regional Manager, Mr. Stephen Yaw Nti, or his deputy, to comment on the farmers' allegations proved unsuccessful as they were reportedly trekking some areas in the region, while other senior staff available declined to comment.

But when contacted, the Sunyani District Chief Cocoa Farmer, Nana Akore Korsah, admitted the government's inability to pay the farmers for their produce.

According to him, cheques covering the payment of their bonuses had been submitted to the COCOBOD who were yet to release the monies.

Nana Akore Korsah hinted that the non-payment of the bonuses had been aggravated by the purple bean phenomenon, slow rate of grading, sealing by personnel of Quality Control Division (QCD) and non-availability of empty cocoa sacks.

The Chief Cocoa Farmer however noted that though the money was not supposed to come from his personal pocket, he had continuously been the recipient of insults, attacks and complaints from the aggrieved farmers.

He therefore appealed to COCOBOD to, as a matter of urgency, address these serious problems so as to encourage the farmers.

This paper gathered that a lot of cocoa was heaped and rotting away in the bush due to non-availability of empty sacks and the lackadaisical attitude of the government with regard to payment to farmers.

Some farmers were afraid to release their cocoa to PBC to avoid suffering the same fate of nonpayment whilst others were reportedly looking for private companies to purchase their produce for prompt payment.

This can eventually lead to smuggling of cocoa into the neighbouring country, thereby shattering the aim of the government to project Ghana on the World Market as the leading cocoa producing country.