Parliament approves military housing loan

General News of Wednesday, April 10, 2019

Source: ghananewsagency.org

2019-04-10

Parliament approved a loan of USD 100,000,000 for the Ministry of Defense for the construction of a housing complex and other rehabilitation works of the Armed Forces of Ghana.

The trade agreement between Ghana, Poly Changda Overseas Engineering Company Limited and Poly Technologies, China, deals with the execution and realization of an accommodation project for the army .

Mr. Collin Owusu Amankwah, Vice Chairman of the Defense and Interior Committee, who introduced the committee's report, said the purpose of the project was to help provide the Forces with Ghanaian Armed Forces (GAF) a decent and modern accommodation allowing them to perform their essential defense task. the territorial integrity of Ghana.

He stated that the agreement and the technical specifications and project designs that accompanied it were tailored to Ghana's armed forces.

Mr. Amankwah also stated that GAF faced a serious housing problem for its men, women and service agents.

He indicated that the government, as part of its program, planned to ensure that the Ghana Armed Forces had newly built housing and to rehabilitate existing dilapidated housing.

He explained that since new officers were recruited and other ranks were recruited each year, senior officers, including majors and the lieutenant-colonel, may live in single rooms designed for the purpose. 39 Originally for young and unmarried officers until they are rebadigned to larger dwellings.

Major Derek Oduro (Rtd), Deputy Minister of Defense, explained that the loan was to build modern housing for officers and men of Ghana's armed forces.

He pointed out that part of the facilities is to rehabilitate existing dilapidated housing and other projects.

He added that there were conditions in which senior officers, including majors and lieutenant-colonel, lived in single rooms originally designed for young and unmarried officers up to the age of 15. that they are reallocated to larger hosting units.

In his intervention, Mr. Governs Kwame Agbodza, a member of the construction and housing clbadification, stated that there was no due diligence on the part of the government before the contract was signed.

He therefore called for an audit of resource optimization to ensure that the cost of the real estate project was not inflated.

He hinted that there was no counterpart funding from the Government of Ghana for the project, which was to be implemented with contractor funds.

In his contribution, Alhaji Mohammed Mubarak-Muntaka, Chief Whip of the minority, urged the government to ensure that the contractor scrupulously complies with the country's local content laws by entrusting some of the projects to local subcontractors.

He added that most building materials, such as sand, stone, wood, etc., should come from national sources for the real estate project.

He urged the Ministry of Finance to formally request the Parliament to lift and raise the necessary taxes and fees to Parliament, so that it can be reviewed and approved in time, so that the project can be implemented without delay.