The North Tongu MP, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, is questioning why the governor of the Bank of Ghana stayed silent on the actual cost of the bank’s new head office during his press conference on Monday, August 21.
Mr Ablakwa says Dr Ernest Addison must be able to publicly disclose the cost of the building if he is proud of the decision.
In a reaction to the Governor’s address on Tuesday, August 22, the former Deputy Education Minister insisted that Dr Addison and his deputies must resign.
“Governor Addison still refuses to disclose to Ghanaians the latest cost of his majestic ‘legacy head office’ project despite his verbose press conference and additional mumbo jumbo press statement.”
“Is Governor Addison embarrassed to publicly mention the colossal figure of US$222.79million which excludes the cost of land?”
“Why is Governor Addison unable to explain to Ghanaians why his insensitive opulent legacy office project keeps spiraling out of budget from an initial PPA approved amount of US$81.8million to the current US$222.79million (excluding land cost)?” he asked.
The Ranking Member on Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee berated Dr Addison for his desire to stay in office despite the demands for his resignation.
“Why is Governor Addison still advertising the spectacular recklessness and gross mismanagement that has led to the BoG making unprecedented losses of GHS60.8billion and negative equity of GHS55.1billion.”
“Governor Addison claims he started his ostentatious legacy project in good times. How can anyone describe a project whose procurement process commenced in 2020 during the peak of COVID-19 as a good time?”
On Monday, the BoG Governor, Dr Ernest Addison at a press conference justified the construction of a new office building for the bank reportedly at a cost of $250 million.
Dr Addison said the new building will have some sensitive features which the current head office building does not have.
These features, according to him, include data centres, currency processing centres and more.
“The Bank then began to plan the building of its new head office taking into consideration the need to ensure that the building meets all the requirements of a modern central bank of international standards similar to central bank head office buildings in Abuja and Dakar and include provision for data centres, currency processing centres, volts and other sensitive installations, so it is not just a simple ordinary building.”
Again, Dr Ernest Addison has explained that the decision to construct a new head office building reportedly at a cost of $250 million, preceded the current economic crisis.
He said the construction commenced in 2019 when the central bank was making profits.
“Appropriations for the Head Office were made each year from profits in 2019, 2020, and 2021. The project has therefore, been going on for over 3 years.”
“The DDEP only took place in January 2023. If we were to be taking the decision today, building a legacy Head Office would not have been a priority. However, this is a project that has been running for three years and about 50 percent complete,” he added.