Minority kicks against ‘duplicate’ US$100 million traffic managment deal

Minority in Parliament is expressing fear government may be setting the country for a huge judgement debt as it uncovers an attempt by the executive to give double approval to a US$100 million loan agreement for traffic management in the Accra.

The contract agreement which is between the Government of Ghana, represented by the Ministry of National Security, Huawei Technologies Company Limited and the China National Import and Export Corporation for an amount of US$100 million dollars is in respect of the Accra Metropolitan Area ICT-ENHANCED Traffic Management Project.

But the Minority says this is a disguised version of an already approved agreement. Per the Parliamentary Hansard of 22nd December, 2018, government gave approval to the Roads and Transport committee report on agreement between Ghana (Ministry of Roads and Highways) represented by the Department of Urban Roads and Beijing Everyway Traffic and Lighting Technology Company Ltd for an amount of US$ 100,000,000 for engineering, procurement, installation and commissioning of the Accra Metropolitan Area Intelligent Traffic Management project.

Addressing the press, former Roads and Highways Minister, Inusah Fuseini notes the two agreements make no difference and that government has changed the name of the contractor in the initial agreement and subsequently moving the agreement from the Roads and Transport committee to the Defence and Interior Committee.

He further cautions that the country risk of paying huge judgement debt if it terminates the existing agreement.

“Today, we don’t know by what explanation that the loan that has already been approved is coming back to parliament, the project that is being implemented is coming back to Parliament and if even we allow them to go ahead, you can be rest assured that what they are going to do will be a candidate for judgement debt”, he said.

Ranking member on the Roads and Transport Committee, Kwame Agbodza Governs who seconded the earlier agreement cautioned government to tread cautiously.

He stated that the government is setting a bad precedent.

He also questioned why the agreement is being taking from the Ministry of Roads and Highways to the National Security ministry.

“What has the synchronization of traffic in Accra got to do with National Security? Indeed, when they came to parliament, they told us they were going to build a control room and that control room, National Security, MTTD and everybody have access to that control room so there is no question as to whether National Security can have access to that control room”, he noted.