The Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly has clarified remarks attributed to its Mayor about street sweeper pay, after journalist Manasseh Azure Awuni said sweepers now earn more than under Zoomlion.
Speaking on Nhyira FM’s Kro Yi Mu Nsem programme on Tuesday, Manasseh said Mayor Richard Ofori-Agyeman Boadi had told him KMA now pays sweepers it engages directly a monthly amount higher than what they received under the previous arrangement with Zoomlion Ghana Limited. “The Kumasi Mayor informed me that sweepers now receive GH¢800 monthly,” he said, describing it as a significant jump from the GH¢250 they had earned before. Manasseh used the same appearance to reject the idea that Ghana’s sanitation sector cannot function without Zoomlion, arguing that Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies can manage waste collection themselves if properly resourced, since assemblies handled the work before Zoomlion’s involvement began.
In a statement issued the same day, KMA said the mayor’s comments had been misconstrued. It confirmed that sweepers KMA engages directly now receive a monthly allowance of GH¢800, but said Ofori-Agyeman Boadi never compared that figure to what Zoomlion paid under the Youth Employment Agency’s sanitation module, and that any interpretation suggesting such a comparison does not reflect what he actually said. The Assembly stressed that its separate Sanitation Improvement Package contract with Zoomlion remains active and unaffected.
The exchange sits on top of a long running campaign. Manasseh’s petition on sweeper pay contributed to government’s decision to end the YEA sanitation module street sweeping arrangement with Zoomlion, and he has pressed the issue publicly since at least 2022, when he wrote to then First Lady Rebecca Akufo-Addo alleging that sweepers were being paid a fraction of what they were meant to receive under a Jospong owned arrangement.
Beyond the dispute over what was said, KMA laid out the practical strain the transition has created. The Assembly said Kumasi previously had more than 580 street sweepers under the YEA module but now directly engages only 102 covering the same operational areas, funded from its own internally generated funds, a reduction it called practically impossible to offset while keeping every part of the metropolis swept daily. It also argued that the 10 percent of the District Assemblies Common Fund earmarked for sanitation falls well short of what a city the size of Kumasi needs. Ofori-Agyeman Boadi was confirmed as KMA’s chief executive in April 2025 with near unanimous backing from Assembly members, after the Ashanti Regional Minister charged him specifically with improving sanitation in the metropolis.
