A Member of the Joint Committee of Trades, Industry and Tourism and Member of Parliament (MP) for Bole Bamboi, Mr. Yusif Suleiman, has, according to a story we carried yesterday, told journalists that the Minority members on the Committee had voted against the GH¢80 million budgeted for the National Cathedral, as part of the Ministry of Tourism’s budget estimate for the year 2023.
“We have voted against it, and we are saying that this is not the time for us to be spending such huge sums of monies in building a Cathedral,” he said. According to him, what led to the Minority’s decision was the inability of the National Cathedral Secretariat, which met the Committee to account for the GH¢339 million that it had already expended on the edifice.
He also alleged that the Secretariat could not explain why the Cathedral had been brought under the Ministry of Tourism. He said the Minority perceived that the Secretariat only wanted to use the Ministry as a conduit in order to get money to continue with the construction of the Cathedral, hence the decision to vote against it.
He, however, assured the members of the Parliamentary Press Corps that the Minority side of the House was not against the Ministry of Tourism’s budget, and that they would go ahead to approve it, excluding the GH¢80 million money for the National Cathedral.
First of all, the Minority side in the House has every right to reject the money set aside in the Ministry of Tourism’s budget estimate for the 2023 fiscal year. Indeed, that is the beauty of democracy. Just recently, the same Minority filed a vote of censure motion against the Minister for Finance, Ken Ofori-Atta, but lost at the end of day.
These are all signs of good governance and democratic practice, and The Chronicle cannot begrudge them.
We are, however, alarmed with the antagonistic stance they have adopted towards the construction of the National Cathedral. In saying this, we are not oblivious of the strong public criticisms against the construction of the Cathedral. Indeed, apart from the Minority MPs, some opinion leaders in this country have also kicked against the project due to Ghana’s economic woes.
But our concern is that the National Cathedral is being constructed in a strategic location in Accra. Before the construction began, several buildings in the area were demolished. Should we, therefore, abandon the project the cost the State of Ghana will incur will be more than the GH¢80 million that is being blocked by the Minority. Again, looking at the deep level the foundation has reached it will start collecting rain water and eventually flood the whole Ridge area, if the project is abandoned.
We must, therefore, abandon our political stance towards the project and see to its completion on time. The State simply cannot afford to allow the land in such a prime area to lie fallow, because we disagree with the construction of the Cathedral. It is upon the basis of this that we think the Minority, even though it is their right to reject the project, seems to have overstretched the issue.
Should the government concede to the public criticisms and even decide to abandon the project, reclaiming the degraded land alone is going to cost us millions of cedis.
That is why we are calling on those criticising the project to look at both the merits and demerits of it. Abandoning the project will certainly come at a huge cost to the nation, and it is time we allowed cool heads to prevail.
