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The Minister of Transport, Mr Kwaku Ofori Asiamah, on Wednesday observed that road infrastructure is critical for the effective implementation of the Government’s flagship programmes.

The flagship programmes are; One District-One Factory, One Village-One Dam, and the Planting for Food and Jobs.
The Minister made the observation on the first day of President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo’s two-day working visit to the Upper East Region.

The Minister, who was responding to concerns raised by the Chiefs and People in the Region about the bad nature of roads in the area, said the ruling Government inherited 72,000 kilometres of roads which were in very deplorable state.

He said out of this figure, only 39 per cent were considered motorable and good, while the rest were graded fair and poor, and noted that it was regrettable that all the loans that were contracted by the previous government to construct roads did not make any meaningful impact.

He indicated that under the previous government, contractors were not paid for about five years, which he noted, compelled many of them to vacate their sites thereby leaving the roads unattended to.

The Sector Minister stressed that because the NPP government attached importance to road infrastructure it had disbursed about GHC1,000,000 in settling road contractors barely eight months that it came into office.

He said additional money from the Consolidated and the Road Funds had been released through the Ministry of Finance and paid to some of the contractors this week, and added that this had made the contractors who vacated their sites to move back to continue with the work.

“This ruling Government under President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, is aware of how critical road infrastructure plays particularly when it comes to the implementation of the flagship programs”.

He added “It is based on this that during our campaign era, the party under its leadership devoted the whole chapter of the manifesto as integrated infrastructure“.

He entreated the chiefs and people in the region to keep hoping that the government would work on the deplorable roads.

He announced that so far 4,200 kilometres of road in the Region had been earmarked for work to commence.
He further assured the people that the three wings working under his Ministry including the Ghana Highways Authority, the Feeder Roads and Urban Roads were assisting in working to improve the status of the country’s roads.

He said the Feeder Roads had awarded 1,360 kilometres of roads networks in the region to contractors to work on them, in addition to the 20 kilometre road network in townships being asphalted.

The Minister mentioned the Bolgatanga–Bawku, Bolgatana, Navrongo-Paga, Navrongo–Chuchuliga, Chuchuliga–Sandema–Waise among some of the roads that are being worked on in the Region and stressed that the Accra-Paga Highway stretch was dear to the Government because neigbouring countries such as Burkina Faso, Togo and Niger use it to the Tema Habour to carte their goods, which rakes in more revenue for the country.