This piece has been inspired by a recent Press Conference addressed by the Christian Council of Ghana, relative to the National Cathedral and its possible completion.
According to the Council, it has decided to form a technical committee; comprising all the various councils of Christian groupings to work out ways through which the project can be actualised in full.
The technical committee would be given a one month’s ultimatum to work on a plan. The report will then be submitted through the sector minister for Local Government, Chieftaincy and Religious Affairs, for onward submission to the President.
This latest position by the Council after the project stalled in 2022, has sparked a national debate between those who want to see the project completed and those who do not. This is not the first time such a debate is happening about this project. Probably, it won’t be the last.
Questions have been asked as to whether the Christian Council was still in existence when Archbishop Dr. Dag Heward-Mills wrote his parting note to the National Cathedral Board and if the alarming things he said in that note in 2022 caught their attention?
They have also quizzed if the Council is satisfied with the work done and whether it tallies with the total financial spend so far? Answers are also being sought as to whether or not the Christian Council is interested in established biblical principles of prudence and accountability at all?
Of key interest is also the question of how the project came to be hurriedly christened THE NATIONAL CATHEDRAL project over night?
Well, it turns out that one man’s promise to God for his personal political favour in an election, was clandestinely converted into a national project with a financial burden on the taxpayer overnight. The politician’s dream had instantly become the taxpayer’s burden!
Very respectable church leaders with huge following and admirable track records were assembled into a board for this purpose. Along the line, some of them fell out and stated reasons for doing so. Did we bother to investigate “nyame adwuma” – that is, God’s work?
Allegations were also made about an official of the project who bore a double identity and had two passports; one being a diplomatic passport, etc. Did that also catch the attention of the Christian Council?
These questions might sound trite, but the more they linger, the more they cast doubts and suspicion on the project. Indeed God’s house is a house of truth and it must be seen being built on a solid foundation of truth!
One of the striking things that also happened was that we even imported a stone from Israel to bury into the foundation. A whole ceremony funded by the state, with heavy media coverage, was organized for this purpose. Records show that we were not only spending money on the project, but were spending on monthly stipends for staff of the project as well. This run through the COVID era.
However, at that time, our economy was in tatters, but we found ways to sink monies that we did not have, into a dug pit that showed no potential of becoming a full-blown cathedral in four years. These are monies that will never come back.
These raise many more questions indeed!
In simple terms, the people were drafted into a deal that they had not called for or agreed to. Agreement was clearly manufactured.
One of the premises of this manufactured agreement which calmed many hearts was that, the state coffers would be safe and that private voluntary contributions would fund the construction. A USSD code was created and people contributed. Other fundraising activities were held both home and abroad to rake in the cash. It turned out not to be completely true.
Another reason was that, as a nation we needed a place like that for religious activities, national unity and tourism purposes.
But when it came to light that recently constructed homes of judges and other private properties, including an embassy had been pulled down, people got alarmed and begun asking questions. Have those investments been wasted?
Who would pay those judgment debts emanating from national cathedral related court cases? So was state resources spent? Of course, monies were spent. Prime state lands were given out for free and we even fulfilled the late Prof. Kofi Awoonor’s prophecy of cutting down a tree to plant in its stead — a huge, senseless, cathedral of doom!
Members of the public also started asking questions about the location and the attendant gridlock it could bring when completed.
Amidst the chaos, the Promisor, President Nana Akufo-Addo, despite all the concerns, code named the project “the priority of priorities”. He hit chest and insisted that by all means necessary the Cathedral will be built and thereafter, the commentaries can continue.
Voices of dissent spoke up. The then opposition used it as a launch pad for its campaign and Ghana gained international acclaim for not doing something right.
It did not end there. The project has also become a safe avenue for Pastors to use their venerable pulpits to blackmail, insult and blame Christians for the unfulfilled promise of one man. Yet, if the people decide to return the favour, by asking for the feet of the pastors who served on the board and at the secretariat to be put to the fire of accountability, hell will break loose.
Respectfully, our Pastors know what the Bible says about pledges. They even know better about making pledges and not fulfilling them. That is why they do not fail to find a way to constantly remind their church members who make pledges to fulfill them because they know them and they have a system of tracking and reaching them.
Yet, in this Cathedral case, the same Pastors know the individual who made the pledge. They know he is alive and well. They have a way to track and reach him. They know they have a duty to remind him and demand that he fulfills his pledge to God. But, instead of invoking the old biblical prophetic phrase “thus sayest the lord”, they have left him to walk freely and have rather chosen to attack, insult and blame those of us who made no pledge.
How ironical! I mean, when was the last time the man who made the promise breathe a word about his promise? Think about it. His wife, the former first lady, Nana’s beautiful Rebecca took offense and reacted visibly when this cathedral matter was brought up in Nana Akufo Addo’s last State of the Nation Address. She had forgotten so soon how she beamed with smiles and applauded loudly when the promise was being made.
Nana had avoided talking about it and he said nothing after it was brought up by the then Minority Leader, Dr. Armah Kofi Buah.
In fact, the situation speaks a lot about Christianity, its leadership and its membership in Ghana. Do we pick and choose?
Don’t get me wrong, I am a Christian. What I am not, is a Theologian or a Pastor, but that hasn’t denied me access to some Bible verses that easily come to mind.
They are:
- 4 “When you make a vow to God, do not delay to fulfill it. He has no pleasure in fools; fulfill your vow. 5 It is better not to make a vow than to make one and not fulfill it.” – Ecclesiastes 5: 4 – 5.
- “Do not be one who shakes hands in pledge or puts up security for debts;” – Proverbs 22:26
Now, let’s work this by the numbers. According to the Deloitte audit submitted to the Presidency on July 18, 2025, and subsequent government disclosures, the project had cost the Ghanaian taxpayer US$97 million so far with only a dug pit at the site to show for it.
In cedi terms, the Finance Ministry told the Parliament of Ghana that GH¢339 million had been released by December 2024. This comprised GH¢225 million to the National Cathedral Secretariat and GH¢113 million directly to the consultant, Adjaye Associates.
Going by these figures, we realize that what was initially announced as a US$100 million project that would not put “undue financial burdens on the state” and would be funded largely by private donations, has now been revised to US$350 million and then to US$400 million due to inflation, design variations and escalation.
Yet, we not out of the woods yet for the intended 5,000-seat main auditorium on a 14-acre site at Osu, plus chapels, a baptistery, a Bible Museum, an art gallery and a music school — intended as a national place of worship, a civic monument and a tourism attraction.
The hard reality on the ground is that just about 10% of the construction was completed before works stalled in 2022, after all the afore-mentioned investments. Yet auditors flagged unauthorized scope additions such as a 350-seater restaurant and biblical gardens costing US$12 million without PPA approval, while the GHS38 million raised via the _*797#_ mobile money shortcode remains unreconciled due to failed transfers and poor record-keeping.
I hope the Christian Council read the room before taking the step they have. I also hope the government carefully reads the room before any action is taken: either to encourage the idea or shut it down before it gains grounds.
After these calculations, one is led to ask how much the construction of the Oil Dome of the Royal House Chapel cost? For the uninitiated, the Oil Dome has a 21,000 seating capacity. And it was built by one man and his church members without dipping his hands into the public purse.
Truthfully, iconic Cathedrals all around the world, were built overtime and with the buy-in of the majority. Ours seems rushed, disorganized and different without tangible reasons to back same.
Anybody raising questions is seen as an enemy of the project. Even Dr. Dag Heward-Mills, with all his stature and might was sidelined in decision-making because he asked questions. With support from his church members, he has been able to do wonders on the Aburi mountains without also dipping his hands in the public purse.
For many Ghanaians, the country has real needs at the moment, for which citizens are looking forward to practical solutions. If the government were to make a list of pressing needs, the Cathedral may not feature in the first 50.
Someone asked a pastor friend of mine in my presence the other day “how does a Cathedral answer the government’s 1:3:3 job conundrum to reduce unemployment?”
The pastor smiled, shook his head and walked away. I am sure he had something to say, but how dare him disagree with what the spiritual fathers of the land have agreed to?
In Ghana, often times when spiritual and religious arguments fly in, common sense flies out. But God in His own wisdom knew why he puts heads on top of out necks. He wanted us to think. And the Christian Council has invited us to a thinking party.
May the very Bible-believing people demanding for jobs to be created for them, not turn against the jobs to focus on building an edifice that they never planned for, which will not provide those much-needed jobs!
By Johnnie Hughes
