Nkonkonsa Celebrity Gossip From Africa
The Minority in Parliament has called on the government to refund the $2 million paid for the Accra Sky Train project.
Speaking on behalf of the Minority, the Ranking Member on the Roads and Transport Committee, Governs Kwame Agbodza, demanded that the amount is paid back into the government’s coffers.
He said the decision of the board and management of the Ghana Infrastructure Investment Fund (GIIF) was an illegality as it breached Article 181 of the Constitution which required that any government entity that intended to enter into an economic venture with an international organisation must seek approval from Parliament.
The 2021 Auditor General’s report revealed that the government spent some $2 million on the Sky Train project.
The Auditor General said after an assessment of the Ghana Infrastructure Investment Fund (GIIF) risk management, it revealed that the policy is still in the draft stage.
The report said the feasibility studies which will better inform the project economics and required approvals from the Cabinet of Ghana and the Parliament of Ghana are still not conclusive.
Africa Investor Holdings Limited incorporated a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) in 2018 in Mauritius for the purposes of establishing Ghana Sky Train Limited to develop the Accra Sky Train Project through a concession on design, build, finance, and operate arrangement.
In 2019, the government of Ghana and (Ai) Sky Train Consortium of South Africa signed the much anticipated Accra Sky Train project, which is a fully automated, highly efficient, and extremely cost-effective public mass transit system that will use air propulsion technology to drive lightweight, high passenger volume vehicles.
But Governs Kwame Agbodza demanded that amount is paid back into the government’s kitty.
He asked: When you have a situation where the minister then says in 2023, now that he always believed that before the project takes off, that should be a cabinet approval, there should be a parliamentary approval, PPA approval since none of these things were approved – In fact, the Auditor General’s report suggested that the company did not even have the necessary license to operate the system they wanted to operate?
So the question is, what was the reason for the government to act in a way to give our $2 million? Who actually took the decision to pay this entity in Mauritius was Dr. Bawumia, the chairman of the economic management team, they call him the strategist now – aware that without any recourse to public financial management or the Public Procurement Act, it was wrong for any government entity to pay that kind of amount?
