The report that the Ghanaian government has secured $145 million credit financing from the World Bank to fund the delivery of urban infrastructure in 35 metropolitan, municipal and district assemblies is one of the trending stories in the Ghanaian press on Tuesday.
The Graphic reports that the government has secured $145 million credit financing from the World Bank to fund the delivery of urban infrastructure in 35 metropolitan, municipal and district assemblies (MMDAs).
The project, which comes under the Ghana Secondary Cities Support Projects (GSCSPs), includes markets, storm drains, roads, pedestrian walkways and streetlights and the credit facility will be disbursed to the assemblies this year, according to their population sizes.
The Minister of Local Government, Decentralisation and Rural Development, Dan Botwe, made this known when he opened the 2022 Ghana Urban Forum in Accra yesterday.
Launched in 2009 with support from CHF International, the Ghana Urban Forum aims to become a permanent forum for all stakeholders in the urban sector to establish a national consensus on dealing with the challenges and opportunities of rapid urbanisation.
This year’s event, a two-day forum, has attracted over 200 experts on urbanisation to discuss relevant urban development issues to promote good governance and development.
It is being held on the theme: “Rapid urban growth in Ghana: Promoting effective urban planning for liveable and sustainable cities and towns”.
Mr Botwe said since its inception in 2018, the GSCSPs had delivered 117 infrastructural projects, providing facilities such as markets, storm drains, bus terminals, roads, pedestrian walkways and streetlights in the assemblies.
He explained that until recently, the $100 million GSCSPs aimed at providing transformational urban infrastructure was meant for 25 municipal assemblies in the country.
Under that initiative, GH¢1,881,553,238 was transferred to the 25 initial assemblies between 2018-2021 to implement several urban flagship sub-projects to promote local economic development.
The implementation of 66 additional infrastructural projects in the 25 municipal assemblies for Urban Development grants One and Two is at various stages of completion,” he indicated.
The newspaper says that three policy analysts have said the measures outlined by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to resolve the economic crisis are inadequate and failed to address some fundamental issues.
According to them, the measures did not show how to achieve the objective of restoring confidence in the economy and hope in the people.
The policy analysts are Prof. Joseph Atsu Ayee and Prof. Ransford Gyampo, both lecturers at the University of Ghana, and Dr George Asekere, a lecturer at the University of Education, Winneba (UEW).
Prof. Ayee, a political scientist at the University of Ghana, said the address did not account for how much the country had saved so far from the 30 per cent cut of budgeted and discretionary expenditures, as well as the salaries of presidential appointees.
Equally important, he noted, was clarity on the strategies the government intended to adopt to ensure that structural challenges with the economy were addressed in the short, medium and long term.
Prof. Ayee, who is also a Public Policy, Administration, Governance and Leadership expert, said since independence, the country had been talking about addressing the structural challenges in the economy but, unfortunately, successive governments had failed to resolve the issue.
“I was disappointed when I only heard about the problems and how we continued to import toothpick and other products, thereby increasing our import bills. What about the long-term measures to systematically deal with the issues?” he asked.
Prof. Ayee pointed out that the President’s speech was silent on measures adopted to ensure a lean government as a strategy to cut down on cost.
He also wanted to hear permanent solutions to the problem of black marketeers in the currency market, a challenge which had existed since the 1970s.
The Ghanaian Times reports that President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has pledged to put appropriate measures in place to improve access and quality healthcare delivery in the country before the end of his tenure in office.
He said projects such as the construction of 111 standard 100 bed district hospitals and accommodation for doctors and nurses in districts without district hospitals were ongoing.
Additionally, he said six new regional hospitals in each of the six new regions would be constructed with three psychiatric hospitals for each of the north, middle, and coastal zones of the country.
The entire projects, expected to be completed by the end of 2024, were being constructed at an estimated cost of US$1.765 billion, he said.
President Akufo-Addo said this when he opened the 46th Annual General and Scientific Meeting of the West African College of Physicians at the University of Ghana, Legon in Accra.
The three-day meeting, which began yesterday, is being held on the theme: “Health and wellbeing amidst a prolonged pandemic: implications for physicians and patients.”
The forum will create a platform for members of the college to share experiences and lessons learnt during the COVID-19 pandemic from the various specialties.
The meeting will explore patients’ perspectives of the COVID-19 pandemic, discuss health system level challenges and policy implications, as well as the role of tele-health in medical practice and medical education
President Akufo-Addo expressed the government’s commitment to take quality healthcare close to every Ghanaian to attain universal health coverage.
On the production of vaccines, he reiterated the government’s commitment to ensure that the pan-African initiative for domestic vaccine manufacturing in Ghana became a success.
MTN Ghana is urging customers who have not completed their Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) card registration with the Ghana card to do so by 31st October 2022 to avoid their services being disconnected.
It said in line with a directive by the Ministry of Communications and Digitalisation, MTN may be required to disconnect the services of customers who have not completed their registration by capturing their biometrics by 1st November 2022.
“MTN Ghana is urging its customers to complete their registration by visiting any MTN Agent Point, Service Centre, Connect Store, or download the self-service app from play store and capture their biometrics,” a statement from the MTN Ghana copied to the Ghanaian Times in Accra yesterday, said.
The Chief Sales and Distribution Officer of MTN Ghana, Shaibu Haruna commenting on the issue said, “We still have a significant number of customers who have either not linked their cards or have not completed registration. We are encouraging every customer to use any of our channels, including the self-service app to complete their registration.”
He said customers could check the status of their registration by dialling *400# to confirm if their SIM cards had been linked ahead of the biometric capture. A “B-Cap Yes” response or feedback means a customer is fully registered.
The Ministry of Communications and Digitalisation announced the mandatory registration of all SIM cards in Ghana in October 2021. The exercise is scheduled to end on October 31, 2022.
GIK/APA