Beneficiaries of the Youth in Afforestation programme are demanding that the Forestry Commission pay them their monthly allowance, which they claim is three months past due.

The aggrieved beneficiaries at Weija (Joma) and Achimota (EcoPark) claim the Youth-In-Afforestation, an internationally-funded programme, has taken responsibility of the debt.

According to them, although the Commission has requested for personal data from them which they have willingly complied with, the information requested is just repetitive. 

"Thus we do not, in our opinion, think it is necessary to be collecting same data multiple times,” adding that failure of payment from the Commission has brought “continuous hardship in our lives.”

They discounted the Public Relations Officer granting interviews to some press to spew falsehood that payments of allowance have been done for June, July and August 2018.

"We consider this as part of the political propaganda and deceits of some senior Staff of the Commission in order ridicule us and undermine our respect.”

The letter is copied to the Chief of Staff, the Executive Director of the Youth Employment Agency; the Greater Accra Regional Manager of the Forestry Commission and the Country Director, World Bank.

There are also reports that the Commission’s hierarchy is planning on cutting the beneficiaries’ allowances beginning next month, the statement reads.

Those beneficiaries believe that the pay cut will undermine the Youth-In-Afforestation programme and destabilize their efforts.

They are requesting that the Commission pay up immediately. Failure to do so, they say, will warrant them to take the “next line of action.”

The Commission did not immediately respond to requests for comment.