The parliamentary candidate for the New Patriotic Party (NPP) in the Essikado-Ketan constituency, Charles Onuawonto Bissue, has explained what necessitated the State’s intervention in the building of the National Cathedral.
He explains even though the President had promised to provide seed money, a land, secretariat and solicit for funds from abroad to put up the project, government saw the need to contribute towards it due to its potential to rake in revenue for the state.
Speaking with Roland Walker on the Big Issue on TV3 Monday, March 11, 2024, the Mr. Bissue indicated that the funds the government committed to the project was not meant to take up the entire edifice but to provide some support for it.
He averred the decision by government was something he found no problem with.
“To some extent you can say that the Cathedral is not needed now and that is why it has delayed and there are reasons behind it. First of all we need to understand what the President said; I believe that he said he was going to leave a monumental legacy and he said he was going to put in a seed money and that land will be provided and also we are going to solicit for funds from abroad.
“If such a huge project is coming into the country and eventually it’s going to benefit all of us; boost tourism amongst others, then we will all go for it so if the government comes in to support, not the entire project, I don’t see any problem with that,” he maintained.
He, however, added that government had to suspend the project due to the emergence of the Covid-19 pandemic which required more health facilities to be put up at the time, giving birth to the government’s visionary Agenda 111.
“However, once we are going along, we realized that there was turbulence in the economy; Covid, Russian Ukraine war, so the economies across the world got affected so it will cascade down to the building of the hospital.
“Every government has its priorities and the cathedral wasn’t number one. We’ve spoken about Agenda 111 along the line when Covid came in. It wasn’t part of the President’s [plans]. So, you’re managing a country and then there is the art of God, you need to restrategise, think about it and move somewhere,” he explained.
His comments come on the back a comment made by John Dramani Mahama, flag bearer of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) questioning the priority of the project at the expense of the needs of Ghanaian students.
Speaking at the Wa Technical Institute as part of his ‘Building Ghana Tour’, John Mahama bemoaned the wastage of almost US$60 million on the project which has given Ghanaians nothing but a hole.
“So far US$58 million of public money has been spent just to dig a deep hole and you have to ask yourself, is it justified in this day and age when children do not have desks in schools, when children do not have textbooks for five years, even though we’ve come out with a new curriculum, because we say there is no money and you say we should use $450 million dollars to build a cathedral, even God will be angry with us,” he lamented Friday, March 08, 2024.
John Mahama’s sentiments had been reiterated on TV3’s New Day by Godwin Edudzi Tamakloe, the Director of Legal Affairs for the National Democratic Congress.
