An ex-Deputy General Secretary of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), has been schooled by his colleague party member and ex-Transport Minister, under the erstwhile John Mahama government, Dzifa Aku Attivor, over a post he made on social media on the ongoing railway project in the country.
She wrote, “It’s not a mirage. It’s real. JM secured a $398 million Indian Exim facility for the construction of the Tema to Akosombo rail line. That is exactly what you saw. At the time this facility was approved in parliament in 2016, you were the Deputy General Secretary of the NDC. Maybe you didn’t know. Now you know”.
Samuel Koku Anyidoho, who does not have his once beloved NDC in his good books in recent times, some days ago, went on social media, showing a picture of him at a railway line project under construction as part of the Tema to Akosombo rail line conceived under the Mahama administration.
Mr Anyidoho, who prayed the project wasn’t a mirage had tried to appropriate the under construction work to the government of President Akufo-Addo, whose administration the former Director of Communications at the Presidency under late President Prof. Mills, seems to have ‘fallen in love with’.
He posted on twitter “Just drove through a town called, Luom; close to Agomeda, on my way to Asutuare, and I saw this railway line under construction. I pray it is not a mirage”.
However, what Koku did not know was that, funding for the project was secured in 2016 by the John Mahama administration, but was unsuccessful at that year’s national elections and so the current administration inherited it.
The $494million Indian Exim facility, is one of the many projects the current government inherited from its predecessor.
The obvious propaganda, could not skip the watchful eye of Mrs. Attivor, who is currently the NDC’s National Welfare Committee chairperson.
Mrs. Attivor, took to her facebook wall and quickly corrected Mr Anyidoho.
She wrote, “it’s not a mirage. It’s real. JM secured a $398 million Indian Exim facility for the construction of the Tema to Akosombo rail line. That is exactly what you saw. At the time this facility was approved in parliament in 2016, you were the Deputy General Secretary of the NDC. Maybe you didn’t know. Now you know”.
Mr Anyidoho, is yet to acknowledge and reply the swift response he got from Mrs. Attivor.
Egypt Kudoto, Special Assistance to the ex-minister, told The Herald “under the government of President Mahama, the Transport Ministry had the Aviation, Maritime, Railway and the Road Transport sub-sectors”.
In the area of aviation, the Ministry had as it policy objective to make Ghana the aviation hub of the West African sub-region, hence the government invested heavily in the development and improvement in aviation infrastructure.
Again, the reason for the massive attention to the aviation industry, Mr Kudoto explained was in direct response to the increasing numbers in passengers using the KIA, and the volume of cargo that comes through the facility.
Under the watch of Mrs. Attivor and Joyce Adeshetu BawaMogtari, as the sector Minister and deputy Minister respectively, Terminal 2 witnessed huge expansion, with lot of office space for the international airlines to operate from.
He said Ghana, currently boasts of the most effective and efficient airport interns of state of the art facilities, in the whole of the sub-region, adding “Terminal 3, has the capacity to handle about 5 million passengers annually”.
Whilst Kotoka International Airport (KIA) was seeing the growth in infrastructure, the other regional airports, were also receiving a lot of attention.
“The Tamale Airport saw a great facelift, with a Brazilian firm; Quiros Galvao transforming the facility from a domestic airport to an international one thus enabling our Muslim brothers and sisters to fly direct from Tamale to Jeddah, in Saudi Arabia, to perform their Hajj”.
Kumasi Airport, he said also saw a facelift, with the provision of critical aeronauticalequipment, enabling the Airport to handle night flights while the Volta region was provided with a brand-new airport, with the Wa airstrip waiting to be transformed into an airport.
The Mahama government, also built an ultra-modern Ghana Civil Aviation Training Academy, with lecture halls, computer and language centres, simulation facilities and conference rooms.
In the maritime sub-sector, the NDC government provided the Ghana Maritime Authority to build a state of the art Vessel Traffic Management Information System (VTMIS) to provide surveillance and the electronic monitoring of Ghana’s coastline and the rich oil and gas deposits zone.
“We also brought a lot of sanity in the area of water transport, following the procurement of three 50-seater high-speed ferries”.
He said “the Ghana Ports and Harbour Authority also expanded the Takoradi Port in the Western Region. This became necessary following the exploration of oil, leading to the arrival of huge ships at the seaport. In this regard, a 1.15 km of breakwater into the sea was done”.
“Again, in partnership with Meridian Port Services, we build Terminal 3 at the Tema Port, which led to creation of several hectares of operational areas for the growing maritime trade. The Port leadership also built a first class hospital”.
The Railway sub-sector was not left out in the massive transformation that took place at the Transport sector.
This included the construction of the Takoradi to Sekondi Sub-urban line, going through Kojokrom.
The $494million Indian Exim secured by the Mahama administration for the construction of a brand-new line from the Tema Port to Akosombo, which is currently ongoing, is to help convey all cargos, meant for the northern part of the country and the Sahelian region to go on the Volta Lake to the North, once it gets to Akosombo by rail.
“Our government” Mr. Kudoto said, also invested heavily in the road transport services, including the transformation of the State owned State Transport Company (STC) and Metro Mass Transport (MMT
