Accra, Ghana - Signs of the last kicks of a dying flagship housing project that had been heavily criticised by the opposition, the see-saw in Parliament of a huge Chinese loan to fund key infrastructural projects and the arrest of 15 officers of the Narcotics Control Board (NACOB) were some of the stories that made the headlines in Ghana this week. The signs had been on the wall for several months that all was not well in the boardroom of STX Engineering and Construction (Ghana) Limited, a joint Ghana-Korea project, heavily supported by the government, to construct 200,000 housing units across the country, where the first 30,000 units will been dedicated to the security agencies. The cost of the project was US$ 10 billion.

Lofty as the project was, especially as the housing deficit is estimated at more than one million units, the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) kicked against it, saying it was a bad deal.

Now, an intractable dispute between the Ghanaian and Korean partners means the deal is all but dead.

“Crunch meeting on STX  scheduled for Tuesday,” was headline of one of the stories on the website of an Accra radio station, Joy FM.

It said feuding partners of the STX Engineering and Construction Ltd were expected to engage in a crunch meeting on Tuesday.

The chairman of the Works and Housing Committee of Parliament, David Tetteh-Assumeng, said it was to iron out all the differences that were bedeviling the project.

“The meeting has become necessary following widely publicized claims of bad faith and expression of lack of trust the partners have raised against each other. So far, the brawl has led to each partner pulling out of the partnership,” the story said.

After the meeting, the pro-opposition Daily Guide screamed 'STX talks deadlocked”.

The newspaper said in another story that the government of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) had acknowledged it would have a big challenge to deal with if its signature housing project, popularly referred to as the STX housing scheme, fell through.

Deputy Information Minister Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, in response to the boardroom maneuverings and wrangling that has beset management of the project, said the government “would certainly have a big hole to plug if this STX deal does not go through and… cabinet certainly needs to meet again and take another decision on how to plug this hole, that is, if this STX deal does not come to light”.

The STX housing project, “we must admit, would have been the biggest step” in addressing the extraordinarily high housing deficit in the country “because that would have been our biggest intervention (in the housing sector),” he said.

An MP of the ruling party, Mr. Kojo Adu Asare, fearing the Mills government could end up being badly embarrassed by the growing boardroom crisis, has called for the immediate abrogation of the deal.

The Government finally got its way on Friday when Parliament approved a 3 billion-dollar loan from the China Development Bank (CDB) to fund many infrastructure projects, including a gas, roads, rail rehabilitation, expansion of the second harbour in Takoradi in the west of the country, irrigation of the Accra Plains and construction of landing sites for fishermen along the coast.

The opposition kicked against the loan, saying it was like giving the government a blank cheque, a charge the government vehemently denied.

“Loan report before House - Hot debate expected” was the headline of the state-owned Graphic.

It said the much-anticipated report of the Joint Committee of Finance and Poverty Reduction Strategy of Parliament on the US$ 3 billion CDB loan was finally laid before the House on Wednesday.

Although the Minority and some civil society groups say the deal will lead to a debt overhang on Ghana and future generations, the government argues that the facility offers a solution to sourcing funds to deal with infrastructure deficit.

Although the motion was scheduled to be moved after the report was laid, the House was adjourned soon after members resumed sitting after a 30-minute break to the disappointment of journalists who had filled the press gallery to cover the anticipated heated debate.

In another story, the Graphic reported under the headline 'Finance minister replaces loan document”, saying a new twist emerged about the US$ 3 billion Chinese loan in Parliament on Thursday when the Minister of Finance, Dr. Kwabena Duffuor, withdrew the original Master Facility Agreement document and laid a new one which addressed some of the concerns raised by the Minority.

But before he did that, the Majority leader, Mr. Cletus Avoka, made similar comments that there was the need for consensus building as far as the loan facility was concerned.

The story of the state-owned Ghanaian Times read “Drama in the House over US$ 3bn Chinese loan” with the story saying the commencement of debate in Parliament of the motion on the Master facility Agreement (MFA) suffered a further delay on Thursday when the minority caucus asked for time to study the new motion document.

The Daily Guide had the headline 'NDC eats humble pie over US$ 3bn loan”, saying the ruling NDC ate the humble pie in Parliament, making a dramatic retreat, as it withdrew the original loan agreement from the House, based on serious concerns raised by the Minority regarding some portions of the deal.

After a hot debate on Friday, the House approved the loan with the Minority abstaining in the vote.

The Ghanaian Times had the headline “US$ 3 bn loan approved after hot exchanges” while the Graphic said “Chinese loan gets green light.”

Daily Guide broke the news of the arrest of several staff of NACOB at the Kotoka International Airport in Accra under the headline “15 Nacob Staff arrested over cocaine at Kotoka Airport.”

It said Ghana’s main entry port, the Kotoka International Airport, had been hit with a series of arrests relating to the multi-million dollar cocaine trade, compelling security agencies to go into overdrive as a number of suspects have been arrested.

It said agents of NACOB arrested 15 of their own personnel, including National Security and Bureau of National Investigations (BNI) operatives, over drug-related offences.

The suspects allegedly connived with suspected drug peddlers at the Airport duty post so that the couriers could export the substances.

The Graphic reported on Saturday that “Court remands 10 NACOB officers over alleged drug deals”.

Pana 27/08/2011