The Minister of Health, Kwaku Agyeman Manu, has provided an update on the timeline for the reconstruction of La General Hospital.
He announced that the Ministry of Finance has successfully secured funding of fifty million euros for this project. During a briefing to Parliament, Mr. Agyemang-Manu also mentioned that the Finance Ministry has identified an alternative local source of funding for the hospital’s reconstruction.
The Health Minister emphasized that necessary processes are currently being carried out to ensure prompt payment to the contractor. He assured that work on the reconstruction would commence without delay. Earlier, the Majority Leader in Parliament, Osei Kyei Mensah-Bonsu, expressed concerns over the lack of funds, which had caused a delay in the hospital’s reconstruction.
He stated that the sponsors responsible for funding the project had withheld the necessary funds. During his statement on the floor of Parliament, Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu explained that the sponsors decided to withhold the funds after Ghana entered into an engagement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
“At the 37th session of the cabinet, the president directed the Ministers of Trade and Industry, Health and Finance to find alternative sources of funding to recommence the project. Through the efforts of the three-man committee, the Minister of Finance has now identified funds locally to continue the project with the same simple work scope but a reviewed price of 50 million Euro,” he said.
“Mr. Speaker, what has happened is that after the engagement with the IMF, funding from those sources that Parliament approved of, the funding has been withheld by the sponsors,” Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu said.
“Mr. Speaker, until the nation is given a clean bill of health by the IMF, it is going to be difficult for the funding to be released. This is why the government now wants to situate it within the context of Agenda 111, and that will mean that the facility will have to be scaled down a bit.”
The hospital was demolished in 2020 due to structural defects, but work on the reconstruction project has yet to begin.
