Saglemi housing project: Attorney General charges Collins Dauda and four others with causing financial loss to the state

The Attorney General has charged the former minister of water resources, works and housing under the John Mahama-led NDC government and serving MP for Asutifi South in the Ahafo Region, Collins Dauda, and four others with causing financial loss to the state among other charges in executing the Saglemi affordable housing project.

A copy of the filed charge sheet dated 30 July 2021 and labelled case number CR/0673/2021 showed that the Attorney General’s Department filed the case at the high court registry at 12.42pm.

The other accused

The other four accused persons, as captured on the charge sheet, are:

• Kwaku Agyeman-Mensah, also a onetime minister of works and housing in the NDC government
• Alhaji Ziblim Yakubu, a former chief director at the Works and Housing Ministry
• Andrew Clocanas, the executive chairman of Construtora OAS Ghana Ltd
• Nouvi Tetteh Angelo.

Top two counts

The first two counts accuse the five men of intentionally misapplying public property, contrary to Section 1 (2) of the Public Property Protection Act 1977 (SMCD 140), and wilfully causing financial loss to the republic, contrary to Section 179A(3)(a) of the Criminal Offences Act 1960 (Act 29).

Initial particulars

The particulars of offence associated with the first count state: “ALHAJI COLLINS DAUDA, between February 2014 and December 2016 in Accra in the Greater Accra Region, you intentionally misapplied the sum of Two Hundred Million dollars (US$200,000,000) belonging to the Government of Ghana by causing the said amount which had been approved by the Parliament of Ghana for the construction of 5,000 housing units to be applied towards the payment of 1,412 housing units under the Saglemi Affordable Housing Project.”

The Saglemi project

Intended to reduce Ghana’s vast housing deficit, the $200 million Saglemi housing project was initiated by the National Democratic Congress (NDC) while it was in government. It was expected initially to deliver 5,000 housing units.

The project site is a 300-acre piece of land near Prampram, in the Greater Accra Region. The planned accommodation consists of one-to-three- bedroom flats, aimed at low-income earners.

The case at the high court seeks to identify why the original output target of the Saglemi project – of 5,000 units at a total cost of $200 million, as stipulated in the financing agreement presented to and approved by Parliament – shrank to 1,502, without a commensurate reduction in the overall loan financing. Only 1,389 housing units have been partly completed.

So far, approximately $197 million – 98% of the budget – has been expended on meeting the revised target of 1,502 units, as against the planned 5,000.

Wilberforce Asare

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