President John Mahama has clarified that his government has continued almost all projects and policies it inherited, with the exception of the National Cathedral, which he described as a personal pledge by the former President to God and not a national policy.
Speaking during the question and answer segment of the Townhall Meeting held in Wa on September 12 as part of the Resetting Ghana Tour, the President said he has nothing against having a National Cathedral, but has always had concerns about its location.
He explained that the current site is already congested with key national installations.
“That place, we have parliament there. We have international conference centre there. We have Greater Accra Regional Hospital there. We have so many things there. So normally during ceremonies, you have the stadium not far. And that’s the way we used to go to Black Star Square. So, if you go and put this major thing there again, it will constrict that whole area. You even have the National Theatre just close by,” President Mahama said.
He added that the second problem was the extent of destruction caused to clear the site.
“My problem was also that the amount of destruction we had to cause to clear the area broke 10 judges’ residences. We broke the Malian Ambassador’s residence. Up to now, we’ve not replaced it. And several other properties, the old passport office, all of them were demolished to make way for a National Cathedral,” he stated.
The President also reiterated his position against the use of public funds for the project, noting that Christians in Ghana and abroad could have funded it through contributions.
“We shouldn’t use taxpayers’ money. How many Christians are there in this country? We all pay a thousand cedis each. We should be able to construct a National Cathedral. And there are Christian groups outside who, if we come together and say we want to construct a cathedral, we should be able to source funding to help. The Muslims have a National Mosque. But that was because they appealed to a Turkish Muslim NGO to build a National Mosque for them. And so government did not put any money into the National Mosque,” he said.
President Mahama disclosed that the forensic audit into the almost 90 million dollars spent on the project is ready and is currently with the Attorney General.
“I am not against the National Cathedral, and we should clarify that. But we also want transparency in the taxpayers’ money that was put into it, almost 90 million dollars. The forensic audit is ready. It’s with the Attorney General, and I’ll make a copy of it available to the Christian Council so that they can look at the processes of what went into the expenditure of the 90 million dollars. So that if there’s any corrective action, we can take it together,” he said.
He revealed that the Christian Council was already meeting with various Christian groups to see how the project can be looked at again.
