Affordable housing project: We can’t complete in December, contractors to Government
Some contractors currently working on affordable housing project at Asokore Mampong in Ashanti region have disclosed they cannot complete their part of the on-going housing project in December this year.
In November 2015, the government handed over the Asokore Mampong project to Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT) to complete, having earlier taken over that for Borteyman project in Accra.
The estimated cost to complete the Asokore Mampong is Sixty-two point thirty-four ($62. 34) million, and being funded by SSNIT.
This excludes the sum spent by the government between 2006 and 2008 before the project stalled in early 2009.
Against this backdrop, board members of SSNIT including former minister of defense Dr. Kwame Addo Kuffuor, deputy minister of finance Abena Osei Asare, Director General of SSNIT Dr. John Ofori Tenkorang among others on Friday July 13, inspected the project which is expected to be completed in December 2018.
Speaking with OTEC news’ Isaac Nsiah Foster Deputy Minister of Finance, Abena Osei Asare, stated the project will deliver a total of one thousand and seventy-nine (1,079) housing units of flats comprising three hundred and thirty-six (336) units of 1bedroom, six hundred and eighty-eight (688) units of 2 bedroom, and 3 units of 3bedroom flats types.
She confirmed the project is being undertaken by 75 contractors with 16 subcontractors and 8 infrastructure contractors, adding that construction works has reached about 75 percent and expected to be completed between September and December 2018.
However a section of the contractors disclosed they cannot finish their part of the work as expected by the board in December 2018.
According to them, they have raised certificates of payment for work done so far, yet they have not been paid by SSNIT.
” We are about 7 contractors who are not paid, meanwhile we are working with loans how can you tell us to finish the project in December this year? It is not possible, they must pay us before we can make full completion of the rest of the work” they stressed.
BACKGROUND
The government of Ghana, as part of its interventions to reduce housing deficit, began an affordable housing project at various locations in five regions of the country.
The objective was to provide accommodation for low to middle income workers, create jobs and build the capacity of local contractors.
The affordable housing project at Asokore Mampong in Kumasi, one of such projects was started by the Ministry of Water Resources, Works and Housing under Hon. Hackman Owusu Agyemang in 2006.
PROJECT DESCRIPTION:
The project consist of ninety-one (91) blocks of 1-bedroom, 2 bedroom and 3 bedroom flats with complementary infrastructure and community facilities such as facilities management block, tarred internal road network with drains and paved walkways, paved car parks, central sewerage treatment plant, water storage and guard house, police station and community shops.
Source: Ghana/otecfmghana.com/Isaac Nsiah Foster
