The chairman of the Trade and Industry Committee of Parliament, Kingsley Carlos Ahenkorah has said the Komenda Sugar Factory could not have produced raw sugar due to the absence of its 37 components.
He said the Price Waterhouse firm valued the factory at $12 million in 2017 and went further to establish that, about 37 components or parts of the factory were not fixed so therefore, the factory could not produce raw sugar as it was displayed by the then NDC government for Ghanaians to believe.
Strategic partner
He, however, assured Ghanaians that, the Komenda sugar factory would begin production anytime soon, once the government found a strategic investor.
He said the process to get a strategic partner was ongoing and soon the entity selected would be announced.
He said currently renovation works on the factory has begun and once the strategic partner was secured the factory would be made operational.
Mr Carlos Ahenkorah was responding to comments of the Minority members on the Trade and Industry Committee who visited the Komenda Sugar Factory last Monday.
The group after the visit accused the current government for causing financial loss to the state on the Komenda sugar factory.
Rebuttal
But rebutting the claims by the Minority members on the committee, Mr Ahenkorah, who is also the Member of Parliament (MP) for Tema West said the current state of the factory should be blamed on the then NDC government who deceived Ghanaians that the factor has started producing sugar when they inaugurated the factory in 2016 but in actual fact the sugar displayed on that day was bought from somewhere.
He said an assessment done on the factory by price waterhouse coopers in 2017 after the NPP administration took over the reins of government indicated that the Komenda sugar factory could not have produced raw sugar due to absence of its 37 components.
He said the price waterhouse coopers firm valued the factory at $12 million in 2017 and went further to establish that, about 37 components or parts of the factory were not fixed.
“So, therefore, the factory could not produce raw sugar as it was displayed by the then NDC government for Ghanaians to believe”, he stated.
He said, this was made known when the price waterhouse coopers was contracted by the NPP government to value the factory to establish its current value as of 2017, but the then NDC government at that time claimed that they spent $35 million to revamp the factory.
The visit
Mr Ahenkorah in an interview revealed that he was surprised to see only the minority members on the trade and industry committee that visited the Komenda sugar factory recently because it was not a decision of the committee to do so and such a visit was not communicated to the whole committee as well.
He said the accusation levelled against the NPP administration by the Minority members on the committee was untenable and a calculated attempt to throw dust into the eyes of Ghanaians that the NPP government was not doing anything about the current state of the factory.
He added that the bad state of the Komenda sugar factory was created by the same NDC government when they lied to Ghanaians that, the factory had produced raw sugar, meanwhile, that was not the case but rather went to credit raw sugar from a company without even paying.
The trade and industry committee chair indicated that the committee has agreed to visit the Komenda sugar factory anytime soon with the Minister of Trade and Industry, price waterhouse coopers, the media and if possible the Finance Ministry to present the true state of the factory to Ghanaians to bring the matter to a finality.