STX Will Be Executed Within The Scheduled Period - STX CEO

The STX Housing project has encountered no problems and will be executed within the Scheduled period, the Chief Executive and Managing Partner of STX Engineering and Construction Ltd, Mr B.K. Asamoah, has said. He told the Daily Graphic that currently a site at Kwabenya was being prepared and added that next week, the sites at Burma Camp and Tesano would be put in shape for construction works to begin. He added that the company had encountered no problems with funding for the project as was being speculated in certain quarters and added that funding had already been secured. Mr Asamoah stated that the arrangement by which the moneys would be released was a project finance agreement and that the monies would be released during the various phases of the project. "We are not raising the money to keep in the government's consolidated fund. We are raising the money to finance a project and at every phase money would be released," he said. According to him, a US company named Western Forms would be in the country to train local contractors in a new technology which would be used to construct the houses; adding that that would enhance capacity building. With this new technology, he said, it was possible to construct a four-storey house within a short time." "The houses would be constructed by Ghanaians and not Koreans as is being speculated. We will be creating jobs for our local people here,� he said. Mr Asamoah noted that 20 per cent of the contract would be sublet to women as part of the President's determination to meet the Millennium Development Goal which dealt with women empowerment. He noted that what was happening on the ground was at variance with the talk in the media and added that officials of the company had been silent because it was clear that the discussions had been laced with politics. He said it was not wrong for the Minister of Works and Housing to have stated that land preparation would begin in July because clearing of some of the sites did actually begin at the end of July. In all, 200,000 housing units are expected to be constructed at the cost of $10 billion under the STX project. It is expected that 20,000 would be provided with jobs as a result of the construction. In January, this year, the President, Prof John Evans Atta Mills cut the sod for work to begin on the construction of 30,000 housing units for the security services at Tesano in Accra. In recent times, some social com�mentators and governance think tanks have expressed doubts about the commencement of the project, suggesting that had not been acquired.