| The NPP minority in parliament won the logical debate over their NDC counterparts on the $1.5 billion housing deal between the government of Ghana and STX Korea. The construction of about 200,000 housing units in the country was yesterday put on hold in Parliament, as the Minority New Patriotic Party (NPP) demanded to see the off-taker agreement contained in the deal. The group also wanted to know why the necessary documents in the agreement were not made available to Parliament for diligent scrutiny before possible approval. Mr. Joe Ghartey, MP for Esikadu/ Ketan explained that all the circumstances surrounding the agreement had not been transparent, particularly so when members of the minority side had not been apprised of the legal authority behind the loan agreement, alleging that the Majority side had hidden information from them. MP for Old Tafo, Dr. Anthony Akoto Osei, who although commended government for its good intention to provide housing units for the security agencies, was of the view that the content of the agreement should be looked at dispassionately since 75 per cent of the country’s GDP was going into the project. The ranking member of the finance committee, Dr. Akoto-Osei, recalled that members of the committee identified a number of discrepancies in the agreement that should compel government to lay another paper to resolve these inconsistencies. He described as unfortunate that the people of Ghana were being asked to pay an insurance cover of over $250million when the country had a sovereign guarantee. However, the Minister for Water Resources, Works and Housing, Alban Bagbin, rebutted the claim, saying the source of funding was not in doubt since the Korean Government was backing the project. He said the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning presented to the Committee on Finance, a letter from the Korean Ambassador to Ghana, indicating that the Korean Government had identified the Global Infra Fund as part of the source from which it was going to support the STX Group, a Korean company which was providing the finance and partnering STX Ghana for the project. President Mills intervened Friday 16th by asking the document to be withdrawn and re-submitted with more detail to make the deal acceptable to both sides. Minority MPs have however laid their stakes and having drawn first blood have promised that there is a lot more to this contract that is not acceptable to them and they intend holding a press conference Tuesday 20th July to make this public.
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