Government's rent assistance scheme is a stepping stone - Tema MCE

The Metropolitan Chief Executive for Tema, Yohane Amarh Ashitey, has reiterated the Akufo-Addo government’s commitment to providing decent shelter for all Ghanaians in future.In an interview in Tema over the weekend, Hon. Ashitey said the recently launched rent assistance scheme is therefore a temporal measure to cushion Ghanaians while the government works on reducing the country’s housing deficit.

“The National Rental Assistance Scheme (NRAS) is just a temporal measure; a stepping stone towards more permanent housing for Ghanaians in the future,” the MCE said.

According to him, “the government is poised to reduce the over 1.5million or so housing deficit in the country and has therefore rolled out projects such as the completion of the Saglemi housing project. However, in life you learn to walk before you walk. As we work to achieve the bigger dreams, we should not necessarily be in distress hence the NRAS.”

The NRAS is a financial support scheme to cushion Ghanaians in respect of their rent needs.

It was launched in Accra last week.The intervention is expected to provide low-interest loans for qualified applicants to enable them to pay their rent in advance.

Vice-President, Dr Mahamudu Bawumia, who launched the scheme in Accra explained that the government had set aside GH¢30 million as seed money towards the implementation of the scheme.

The scheme would be rolled out initially in the Greater Accra, Ashanti, Western, Eastern, Northern and Bono East regions.

According to Hon. Yohane Amarh Ashitey, the scheme will also help to sanitize the country’s rent sector and dispel the current situation where expatriates are more favoured by landlords and landladies than Ghanaians.

“The reason why landlords and landladies prefer to rent to expatriates is because the expats often have ready cash to dole out while for most Ghanaians, some grace period is needed to raise rent advances.

"The NRAs will make it easy for Ghanaians to be as competitive for rent as the expatriates who come to town from other countries, the NPP government has good plans for Ghanaians and I support the recent claim by the hardworking NPP Chairman for Tema East that NPP is better than NDC,”Hon. Yohane Amarh Ashitey said to thunderous applause from journalists”.