General News of Wednesday, 4 October 2017
Source: Starrfmonline.com
2017-10-04
Sanitation Minister Kofi Adda
The minister for Sanitation Joseph Kofi Adda has justified the refusal of President Akufo-Addo to acknowledge the efforts of former president John Mahama in the Jambusi Water Project which was commissioned on Tuesday, October 3, 2017.
The NDC has been angered by the president’s apparent snub over a project which was implemented under the Mahama administration.
In a statement, the Upper West regional branch of the largest opposition party accused the President of showing bad faith and urged him to apologise to the former president.
“We were thinking that as a president who is for all he could have thanked his predecessor for…securing for the fund and initiating such a wonderful project. He didn’t do that. But rather tried to claim what was not started by them, what they know nothing about. He was trying to rewrite the history of that water project,” the statement said.
It also dismissed claims by the President that the project started under former President John Kufuor.
“The project never started under former President John Agyekum Kufuor’s regime. It was never started. This project was actually started under the leadership of [former president Mahama].”
Responding to the claim, Mr. Adda said the president was right for crediting Mr. Kufuor for the project.
“The President cannot apologise and will not apologise because the fact of the matter is that this project was initiated by the then chairman of the board of directors of the Ghana Water Company, the late Alhaji Musa, who happens to hail from Wa. He brought the idea before the Kufuor government; that the Wa water situation was not good at all.
“And so the matter when it came before the Kufuor administration, was put forward by the Dutch government who agreed that they would fund it, and as it delayed, we sought to funding from the Korean government and I remember I joined the current President Nana Addo with the President at the time to a far eastern visit to China, Korea and Japan. At the time in Korea, the matter was discussed as to whether they can support it and their answer was in the affirmative. And so that is how the project started,” he recounted.
