General News of Wednesday, 12 December 2018
Source: Starrfmonline.com
2018-12-12
Samuel Atta Akyea, Minister of Works and Housing
Participants at the just ended 5th National Policy Summit (NPS) have made a strong appeal to the government to use the resuscitated State Housing Company (SHC) as the major vehicle towards clearing the almost 2 million housing deficit in the country.
Speaking on the topic ” Bridging the Housing Deficit-The Role of SHC, Mr George Osei-Bimpeh, a panellist representing Civil Society Organizations advocated for a change in direction by the government by fully resourcing SHC to lead the charge in the housing industry.
To the participants, SHC must lead every housing project the government would embark on. Their arguments stem from how previous housing projects undertaken by the government in partnership with the private sector have been embroiled in controversies which sometimes lead to the halting of such projects.
The SHC although is owned by the government, has been a private Company since 1995 and so the participants believe that it should be more reliable dealing with SHC and that if any profits were to accrue from such projects, the government would, in the end, benefit more since SHC would pay dividends.
Another basis for the appeal to the government is that the government can use SHC to enforce approved building policies which would be more economical.
The Chief Executive Officers (CEO) of eight State Owned Enterprises (SOE) and state programmes who attended the program in the Western Regional Capital of Takoradi, outlined details of a turn-around in their operations over the last 20 months.
They included the Accra Digital Centre, Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), Free Zones Authority (GFZB), State Housing Company, and Food and Drugs Authority (FDA).
The National Policy Summit is a public-private initiative by the Information Ministry of (MoI) which provides a platform for explaining government policies, plans and activities to the citizenry and also collect feedback for policy adjustments.