The national secretariat of the Ghana Federation of Disability Organisations (GFD) has reached an agreement with the Ada East District Assembly to begin disbursing the first two quarters of the 2026 Disability Common Fund while the General Assembly considers the dispute over the December 2025 disbursement.
The 2026 exercise is expected to cover about 100 new applications that have been pending since the beginning of the year, as the Assembly has not been able to consider fresh applications due to the unresolved dispute over the December 2025 disbursement.
The GFD said it was unacceptable for more than GH₵1 million – an amount the Assembly disclosed was in the Disability Fund account – to remain undistributed while its members continued to need support.
At a meeting on Wednesday, October 21, 2026, the parties agreed that the Fund Management Committee (FMC) should meet immediately and begin the disbursement process.
This will include assessing applicants’ needs, vetting the applications and setting a date for the distribution.
The meeting followed sustained reporting by DisabilityNewsGH.com on the dispute that arose after the December 2025 disbursement was boycotted by members of the disability community.
They objected to cash support being replaced with physical items and raised concerns about the items’ condition, suitability and value.
Earlier that day, the GFD delegation met with leaders of the local federation to hear their account of the issues.
The local leaders gave a historical account of what they described as mismanagement of the Disability Common Fund in Ada East dating back to 2011.
They expressed frustration over what they said had been the repeated abuse of funds intended to support persons with disabilities in the district.
The GFD team, led by its President, Mr Joseph Atsu Hormadzi, and Acting Deputy Executive Director, Mr Moses Forjour, subsequently met with the Assembly Administration to discuss the dispute and possible steps towards resolving it.
At the meeting with the Assembly Administration, District Chief Executive Mr Kenneth Kabu acknowledged the issues raised by the local disability community.
He said his checks, including a review of the investigation committee’s report, indicated that the items presented for the December 2025 disbursement were overpriced. He added that he was thankful the supplier had not yet been paid.
Mr Kabu assured the disability community that he would work to prevent similar situations from arising in future.
The GFD called for transparency and accountability in the Assembly’s administration of the fund.
Both parties also accepted the committee’s recommendation to make a fresh disbursement of the disputed 2025 allocation.
Under the proposed arrangement, beneficiaries who received less than their approved amounts would receive top-ups, while those who received nothing would receive their full approved allocations.
They agreed, however, that implementing the recommendation would not replace the need for the investigation report to be presented to the General Assembly for consideration and a decision.
That assurance follows controversy over the handling of the report. The Presiding Member, Hon. Philip Tetteh Atchia, previously sent it to the FMC for consideration and implementation rather than presenting it to the General Assembly, which had commissioned the investigation.
Hon. Atchia told DisabilityNewsGH that the Assembly Administration had cited the cost of convening an emergency General Assembly sitting as the reason for sending the report to the FMC.
GFD representatives on the FMC, including its chairperson, boycotted an emergency meeting called to discuss the report, preventing the committee from proceeding with the proposed implementation.
The final report, which DisabilityNewsGH has found contains substantial changes to recommendations in earlier versions, is expected to be presented to the General Assembly for debate and adoption in the first week of November.
SOURCE: DisabilityNewsGH.com
