Oppong Nkrumah faces down Inusah Fuseini over NPP/NDC records

Inusah Fuseini, a former minister roads and highways in the government of John Mahama, has accused Vice-President Mahamudu Bawumia of peddling lies by stating that the last NDC government built the Kwame Nkrumah Circle Interchange in Accra at the whopping cost of US$260 million.

Vice-President Mahamadu Bawumia accused the NDC of shortchanging Ghanaians with the Circle Interchange project in a presentation at the Town Hall Meeting and 2020 Results Fair, which opened at the Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences in Accra on Tuesday.

How to stay accountable

The NPP has initiated 17,334 infrastructural projects across the country in the past three and a half years, Dr Bawumia said, as he launched an online tracker to monitor delivery of infrastructure. Intended to promote transparency and public accountability, the tracker is the first of its kind anywhere on the African continent.

So far, 8,746 out of the 17,334 projects have been completed, Dr Bawumia said. Work is still ongoing with the remaining 8,588, which are scattered across the country.

The vice-president further announced that the government will be spending US$289 million to build the Obetsebi-Lamptey, Pokuase and Tema interchanges, all in the Greater Accra Region, together with one in Tamale, in the Northern Region.

He then invited Ghanaian voters to compare this cost of $289 million to the $260 million the NDC spent on building the Kwame Nkrumah Interchange alone.

Scandalised

But speaking this morning to the host of The Asaase Breakfast Show, Kojo Mensah, Honourable Fuseini described the figure the vice-president quoted as a blatant lie.

According to Honourable Fuseini, the NDC spent only €74 million to build the interchange, contrary to Dr Bawumia’s claim.

“If you go to Ghanaweb and just pull up ‘Kwame Nkrumah Interchange’ you will not fail to realise that it cost €74 million to construct … I don’t know by which exchange rate application that converts … to $260 million.

“I am scandalised. I don’t think the vice-president, who is the second most important person in this country, should peddle such untruths.

“I am challenging him: you go to the Highways Ministry and check,” Honourable Fuseini told Asaase Radio.

He also expressed shock at the vice-president’s assertion that the NDC did not finish building a single major road in any of the then three Northern regions during Mahama’s four-year tenure from 2013 to 2017.

Disputed figure

However, also speaking on The Asaase Breakfast Show minutes later, the Minister of Information, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah, insisted that the vice-president had not erred in his submission on Tuesday.

Oppong Nkrumah explained that the NDC built only the first phase of the Circle Interchange project at €74 million: the equivalent of roughly $90 million. The second phase cost approximately $170 million, he said, making a total of $260 million.

“The two key issues [Honourable Fuseini] just raised are contradictory, because there were some projects started by the NDC but completed under the NPP,” Oppong Nkrumah said.

“The said amount of €74 million is correct [for the first phase], but by the time they finished the second phase the cost went up, amounting to €260 million.

“Ghanaians have legitimate questions to ask,” the minister said.

Fred Dzakpata

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