Inflating contract sums now official

THE Minister of Education, Betty Mould Iddrisu, finally confirmed on Wednesday the long-held suspicion and position of the New Patriotic Party that there has been an unprecedented culture of corruption in the award and costing of contracts since the National Democratic Congress took office in 2009.

An example of the grand inflation of contracts has been with the construction of classroom blocks across the country. In 2008, a six unit classroom block with an office, staff common room, a store, a toilet facility all attached was constructed at the cost of GH¢84,000.

However, in the “Better Ghana” of President Mills where inflation, we are told, is declining and has reached a single digit, where the currency is stable and at a point was even appreciating against major currencies, the price of a similar classroom unit has shot up by nearly 200% across the country.

According to the Minister, these figures (cost of the classrooms) were prepared by experts, both at the Ministry of Education and the Government’s AESL (Architectural and Engineering Services Limited).

She also added that the cost per a six-classroom block depended on the materials used in the construction and the region in which it was located.

This is absolutely incredible and a clear manifestation of the naked corruption that has got so out of hand under the Mills-Mahama maladministration. Even the founder of the NDC, Jerry John Rawlings, in his recent boom on June 4, described his own NDC government as the most corrupt administration in the history of the fourth republic.

In April this year when the issue of the inflated nature of these contracts were raised, some government officials, led by Baba Jamal, a Deputy Minister of Information, engaged in what can best be described as “shameless attempts” to downplay it with barefaced lies.

The Ghana News Agency published in the Wednesday, April, 2011 edition of the state-owned Daily Graphic, a 20-seater toilet facilities being constructed at Salamba and Lamakara-Zongo in the Tamale Metropolis are costing the nation a sum of GHC 112,000 each.

Again, a 12-unit classroom block being constructed for the Queen Elizabeth Day Nursery and a 3-unit classroom block with a six-seater KVIP for the St Josephs JHS, all in the Tamale Central, are costing the nation GH¢417,000 and GH¢228,000 respectively.

It was also revealed last month that Ghana is now sourcing for funds or has now secured funds for the $1.5 billion STX project, a project which received parliamentary approval in August 2010, an indication that government is prepared to forgo due diligence in its hurried attempts to go in for inflated loans at grave cost to the nation.

Under President Mills, the Government of Ghana has also entered into contractual agreements with some “shady” companies outside the country that leaves much to be desired.

Opus 7, a clay maker, is one example of a company contracted by Government to provide a loan facility to construct 70 district hospitals at an inflated cost $40 million dollars per hospital. This is a husband and wife company with a stated capital of some $5,000.

The acquisition of these over inflated loans smacks of grand corruption and will certainly lead this country back to HIPC, if this is not checked.

The decision by the media not to probe further these glaring acts of corruption is deeply worrying. These are the issues the media must bring to the attention of the public because the tax payers money is being siphoned into people’s pockets.

President Mills is complaining about not having money to complete major road projects started by the previous government. If he continues to spend Ghana’s precious money on new contracts with inflated costs then that Better Ghana he promised is bound to happen in the bank accounts of the selected few, while the vast majority of Ghanaians get poorer.

It seems this government is on an agenda to pile as much debt on Ghanaians as it possible can, as well as grabbing as much as it can, knowing 2012 will certainly result in a defeat for them.