Former Chief Executive Officer of the Youth Employment Agency (YEA), Kofi Agyepong, has denied claims that his administration blocked an allowance increase for beneficiaries under the YEA-Zoomlion sanitation module.
His response follows recent suggestions by Zoomlion that the previous YEA leadership rejected a proposed raise in allowances for sanitation workers.
Mr. Agyepong in a recently released statement expressed his disagreement with the claims made. “I wish to categorically state that no such counter-proposal was made by the YEA during my tenure as CEO.”
He clarified that under his leadership, YEA proposed an allowance of GHS 500 per beneficiary—an amount he described as fiscally responsible given the agency’s budget constraints.
According to him, Zoomlion’s counterproposal was for a GHS 1,308 monthly allowance, of which GHS 888 would be retained by the company as a management fee—leaving only GHS 420 for the actual worker.
“This proposal, in our view, was excessive, unjustified, and unfair to the sweepers. It was rejected outright by my management and Board, and we officially communicated our position to Zoomlion,” Agyepong stated.
He added that discussions on the matter ended during the 2024 contract renewal meeting, contrary to claims that talks were ongoing. Subsequent engagements, he said, focused on payment flows and logistics.
The former YEA boss urged Zoomlion to ‘come clean’ and called on the public not to view scrutiny of the YEA-Zoomlion relationship as partisan, but as part of efforts to ensure fairness and accountability.
See statement below: