Churches to rescue stalled GETFund projects

Pupils and teachers of the Nkwanta Presbyterian Primary School in the Asante-Akim South District have for the past two years been forced to turn worship centres into makeshift classrooms as construction work on a six-unit block for the school had stalled.

The old school building in the community was pulled down in year 2012 to make way for a new GETFund-assisted classroom block, but the project got stalled when it reached the roofing stage.

The situation is causing frustration and anger among the people because of its negative impact on academic work.

Mr. John Yaro, the assembly member for the area told a team of reporters of the Ghana News Agency (GNA) who were in the area under a STAR-Ghana sponsored media auditing and tracking of development project.

The tracking initiative which was to monitor how government resources were affecting the lives of the people, noted that the project, which was originally scheduled to be completed within eight months, had been abandoned.

Mr. Yaro said for almost two years now, nobody could tell when it would be completed, and that, he was constantly in touch with the contractors to get them back to work, but their excuse has been that “there is no money”.

The district assembly, he said, was also helpless because it has not budgeted for it.

Mr. Isaac Obeng Sarpong, an opinion leader, said the delay could affect the quality of education in the community.

Already, the Pentecost and Methodist churches are putting a lot of pressure on the school to relocate.

This is giving the parents and the general population sleepless nights and he appealed to the government to do everything to complete the project.