The outgone NDC government has left the Nana Addo led administration an outstanding commitment of 17.2 billion cedis in the roads sector, Minister Designate for Roads and Highways, Kwasi Amoako Atta has revealed.
He describes the figures as alarming as government’s revenue streams are inadequate to meet the rising debts.
Mr. Amoako Atta made the disclosure when he met the Appointments Committee of Parliament on Wednesday.
“There is a commitment of 17.2 billion cedis on road contracts and we have 1,282 road contracts with 87 bridges ongoing we have almost 900 million certificates raised and ready resting and gathering dust at the Ministry of Finance unpaid,” he stated.
He added, “It’s quite frightening and there is a huge funding gap and the true state of affairs is that awards were being made without proper reference to expected inflows.”
Meanwhile the road levy that is established to generate revenue to offset some of these debts is also not performing as expected.
The fund is reported to be generating an annual return of 1.2 billion cedis.
The disclosure comes at a time that the NPP government has announced to review downwards the energy sector levies.
The levy also increased the allocation to the road sector fund from 4 pesewas to 70 pesewas.
Energy Minister, Boakye Agyarko maintains that the revision is necessary to relief consumers of the huge tax burden.
Responding to concerns on whether or not the energy sector levies were a nuisance tax, Kwasi Amoako Atta rather called for more pragmatic efforts to address the issue.
“Whatever we do to improve our economic situation, no matter the difficulty must be done with a human face…we needn’t embark upon anything at all.”
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(Via: CitiFM Online Ghana)
