Cecilia Abena Dapaah
The Minister-designate for Aviation, Cecilia Abena Dapaah has promised to continue with all the ongoing projects at the Kotoka International Airport, Kumasi Airport, Tamale Airport and Ho Airports which a lot of money has been sunk into by the previous government.
She said the development of the Wa Airport which is so strategic especially in feeding the Tamale Airport with traffic will be another priority project of her ministry
Speaking at the Appointments Committee on Wednesday, the Aviation Minister-designate said the previous government has spent $274 million on the construction of a new terminal at the Kotoka Airport, $170 million on the redevelopment of the Tamale Airport, $28.2 million on the Kumasi Airport and $25 million on the Ho Airport with work undone supposed to cost extra $80 million at the Kumasi Airport and $70 million at the Ho Airport.
She also told the committee that it would be one of her major priorities to have an international airliner for the nation and that negotiations have already started in establishing a new airliner for the nation to bring some national pride to the nation and help reduce the influx of foreign international airliners in Ghana.
She said there is a huge potential in the airline industry stressing that 60% of all travels are done by air and that currently there are 1.2 billion potential air travellers across the African continent and 7 billion in the world.
She also noted that she would work hard to promote and sustain domestic air travels and also make it cheap for the ordinary Ghanaian to use domestic flights.
She said as indicated in the manifesto of the NPP, the government would scrap the VAT on domestic air travels to make domestic air travel a bit affordable and to lessen the burden on the cost of domestic airline operations.
The Minister-designate said she would work with domestic operators to eliminate things that hamper their operations.
She identified monitoring as one key area the aviation authorities are lacking in the conduct of their work, promising to take it up.
According to her, if operators had been monitored by the previous government, passengers would have felt the impact of the reduction in aviation fuel.
No Funeral Cash
The Minister-designate for Inner Cities and Zongo Development, Alhaji Abubakar Saddique for his part told the Appointments Committee that the $50 million seed money for the Zongo Development Fund would not be shared amongst residents of Zongo but rather used to improve education and other needs within the Zongo communities.
He indicated that he would look at innovative ways of increasing the fund since the needs of the Zongo communities are myriad.
He said that he would collaborate with the Ministry of Interior, Ministry of Works and Housing, Ministry of Sanitation and Water Resources to bring holistic development to the Zongo communities.
He stressed that they would be building more schools for Zongo communities, build libraries and stock them, build ICT centres and resource them well and also pay Islamic instructors attached to schools well.
He said road networks in these deprived areas would also be improved through collaborative work with the Ministry of Roads and Highways.
He said they will also focus on training of the youth in the Zongo areas to be more ICT compliant and also help provide jobs for the youth through collaboration with the private sector.
He said he would work with the Ministry of Interior closely to reduce the high rate of crime in the inner cities and Zongo areas by increasing police patrols and police presence in those areas.
He disclosed that the Ministry would give more scholarship to girls living in those areas to be able to go higher on the education ladder and help in tackling the high level of illiteracy rate in those areas.
The Minister-designate for Inner Cities and Zongo Development said the people living in the Zongo areas are naturally gifted in doing petty businesses while many are also talented so giving the right business support they would be able to create more jobs for themselves by expanding their businesses.
He said a lot of conscientisation would take place in these areas to help get rid of ‘injurious’ traditional practices like marrying off girls at very young ages and giving girl-children the opportunity to get better education.
He said as a minister, he would not discriminate against any tribe found in the Zongo areas
352 Chieftaincy Disputes
The Minister-designate for Chieftaincy and Religious Affairs, Samuel Kofi Dzamesi who also took his turn at the vetting on Wednesday said the Chieftaincy institution is paramount in the development drive of the country and that the institution would be used to generate wealth to facilitate development at the local level.
He said currently there about 352 chieftaincy disputes across the country which is a worrisome situation because such disputes stagnate development in those areas stressing that the Ministry will empower the Judicial Committees of the Traditional Councils and Houses of Chief s financially to be able to regularly sit and resolve those disputes.
He told the committee that since the chieftaincy institution is very much revered, chiefs must be advised to abstain from dabbling in partisan politics.
He announced that a Royal College would be established to give education to chiefs in that direction.
He also asked chiefs to get copies of the code of conduct of chiefs authored by the former President of the National House of Chiefs, Prof Nabilla to enable them know what chiefs must do and what chiefs must not do.
On the religious front, the Minister-designate said the Ministry will formulate a policy to ensure that everyone practices his or her faith without infringing on the rights of others.
The Minority Leader, Haruna Iddrisu who is a ranking member of the Appointments Committee strongly disagreed with the President creating Religious Affairs ministry since he believed the state will indirectly be interfering with affairs of religion.
He believes the state must stay away from religious matters since religion must be practicised without any interference and the need for heads of religious bodies to be independent and neutral.
By Thomas Fosu Jnr