Accra, Ghana’s capital, is congested. This has affected business operations and slowed the delivery of both public and private services. The traffic in the city alone affects productivity due to the numerous hours wasted by commuters to make a short distance.
John Dramani Mahama, flag bearer of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), in order to decongest the city, has hinted of plans to establish a new administrative city outside the Greater Accra region.
The plan, which he says would take about 20 years to be executed, needs to start somewhere before subsequent governments continue.
He says the new city will host some ministries, departments and agencies, in order to help put Accra in proper shape.
At a meeting with the European Union Ambassador and the EU Chamber of Commerce Tuesday, May 28, 2024, John Mahama noted that his administration “will start the plan and the design and the feasibility” so that others would continue when they take over.
“We will start a visibility study and a plan to build a new city. Accra is getting grid-locked. The time has come for us to move some parts of the government’s services out of Accra. Accra will continue to be the capital but we’ll move part of it outside…there is land on the Accra plains, there is land on the other bank of the Volta Lake and all that.
“Already we are going to have a port terminal at Mpakadan to move cargo to the northern part of the country. There is a lot of land there and so we can move some of the ministries, agencies, departments out of the city so that we decongest Accra because Accra has expanded to its limit. The way it is growing if we are not careful it will be difficult to continue to manage it as a viable city.
“We will start the plan and the design and the feasibility. I believe that this would be a project that would take maybe 20 years to fulfill but we need to start somewhere so others would come and continue from where we leave off,” he relayed.
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