Okyenhene Osagyefuo Amoatia Ofori Panin has stated that Ghana needs to build stronger indigenous construction industry to be able to execute multimillion dollar contracts in and outside the country.
He has therefore called for empowerment of local contractors through capacity building and favourable financial arrangements.
He therefore bemoaned delayed payment to indigenous contractors which is crippling their businesses.
Okyenhene questioned why no Ghanaian contractor was given contract to build any of the numerous interchanges in the country.
“I have seen the interchanges all around.i will like to know which one was built by an indigenous Ghanaian company.Big monies ! At Independence,Eden Clark and the people said this country by this time will be a first world nation. Singapore, South Korea and Malaysia have gone ahead. They are not better than we are. They are not smarter than we are. The Ghanaian human resource have been able to compete anywhere in the world. So why are we here.”
He also lamented why after 60 years Ghana cannot boast of a superhighway connecting the two major cities of the country.
In 65years we have not been able to put a superhighway together between Kumasi and Accra.
“We travel in pain ,we travel scared ,we waste time. When you look at Singapore when I speak with them they tell me they believe in their own people. When we build roads, what you are doing is you are connecting disadvantage people to economic and social opportunities.when you do that you are widening the circle of opportunities. You are making productivity go on. People in rural areas will be able to bring their food stuffs to the market with ease prices will be stablized. Jobs will be created new communities will be built.
Okyenhene said this in a speech delivered in Koforidua during Infrastructural conference organized by the Ghana Chamber of Construction Industry (GhCCI).
The Ghana Chamber of Construction Industry (GhCCI)said government is killing the local construction industry due to delay in payment for construction work done.
The chamber stated that chronic delay in payment to local contractors is crippling the industry and leading to job losses.
The delayed payment and funding challenges bedeviling local construction industry took the center stage of the Infrastructural conference organized by the GhCCI in Koforidua on the theme ” Project finance and funding Methodology for Infrastructure Development in Ghana:The case of the Chamber of Construction Industry and delayed payments with its associated interest matters”.
The President of the Ghana Institution of Engineering (GhIE), a member of the Chamber Ing. Rev. Prof. Charles Anum Adams told journalists at the sidelines of the conference explained that government is still owing some contractors who have worked from 2015 making live unbearable as their creditors pursue them.
Rev. Prof. Charles Anum Adams said failure to pay contractors has multiple chain effect on the local economy and job sustainability.
He said governments mistreatment of local contractors is the reason Ghana cannot boast of a single one local contractor with capacity to build an interchange in the country.
Meanwhile ,the Ghana Chamber of contraction industry (GhCCI) has suggested to government to leverage on innovative public-private partnership (PPPs) and Project Finance approaches to develop funding need for local contractors to save the industry.
Source: Mybrytnewsroom.com /Obed Ansah
