Govt claims to have released  GH¢800M for Contractors Hoax

The widespread publication by both the local and traditional media to the effect that the government through the Ministry of Finance has released GH¢800 million for the payment of outstanding arrears to all road contractors in the country has turned to be a total hoax.

The Minister of Roads and Highways, Mr Kwasi Amoako-Atta, who disclosed this at the inauguration of the Ghana Road Fund Management Board, indicated that substantial payments had already been advanced to road contractors in the country.

But information picked up by Soireenews.com from the members of the Association of Road Contractors Ghana indicates that no amount of money has been released by the government to settle debts owed members of the association.

Instead, this news outlet learned that the announcement by the minister of roads and highways was a face-serving exercise, ostensibly to throw the dust into the eyes of the good people of this country.

Some of the road contractors who spoke to Soireenews.com on condition of anonymity stated that when the minister of roads and highways made the public announcement which was widely publicised by several newspapers and online portals that the finance minister has made that money available they welcomed the decision by the government.

But they were quick to note that even that amount claimed to have been released by the government was not enough to pay all road contractors to continue with abandoned projects across the country.

They said not every contractor will resume work even if the monies were paid.

“It is not enough to satisfy us because there are some contractors who cannot even buy drugs and food for themselves.  So I think the funds cannot probably provide for some of these things. Once the funds are released by the banks, some people will go back to the sites- not everybody will.”

According to them, two weeks later when they went to their various banks to check whether the money had been deposited into their accounts, they were surprised to be told by their bankers that no money had been paid into their accounts.

"We were shocked to hear from our bankers that no monies have been paid into our accounts by the government. So we quickly went to the Ministry of Finance and there we were told that there was no documentation to that effect to pay local road contractors of their outstanding balance of the debts owed them by the government," the contractors said.

They fumed that this was not the first time the government had deceived them.

According to them, the government of Ghana was still highly indebted to road contractors who are yet to be paid funds running into the tune of about GH¢3.69 billion. This, they said, dates back to 2019.

They pointed out that although the Association of Road Contractors Ghana was still on the government's neck impressing upon it to settle its indebtedness to them, the latter has failed to pay, resulting in the untimely deaths of some of their members.

"We are fed up with the government’s litany of promises,” they angrily expressed.

Although the government has paid over GH¢2.2 billion of the funds in arrears, the delay in settling the outstanding debt was affecting the construction industry.

They intimated that the government is dealing with them unfairly, adding that the deliberate delay of the government to release funds to pay members of the Association is complete amounts to causing financial loss to the state.

"Our financial houses (banks) do not even want to see our faces in the premises (in their banking institutions) just because we owe them big and we are not in good financial positions to pay back the loan facilities we secured from them,” they said.

Against the backdrop of the above, the road contractors entreated the ministry of roads and highways, the ministry of finance and all other relevant stakeholders involved in the payment of these funds to “kindly facilitate the payments, as the road contractors are going through trying times.”

Freeman Koryekpor Awlesu Greater Accra Regional Correspondent