Circle 'Dubai' cost $90m not $260m, Bawumia lied – Sammy Gyamfi

The claim by Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia that the Kwame Nkrumah interchange cost $260 million is a “barefaced lie,” National Communications Officer of the main opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) Sammy Gyamfi has said.

Dr Bawumia at a town hall meeting last week said the NDC government constructed the Kwame Nkrumah Interchange at a cost of $260 million while four interchanges constructed by the NPP government cost $289 million.

Speaking at a press conference in Accra on Monday, 24 August 2020, Mr Gyamfi noted that the Vice President lied.

“What Dr Bawumia did was that he added the cost of two separate and distinct projects (Kwame Nkrumah Interchange and the Ring Road Flyover) and created the impression as though that was the cost of just one project, the Kwame Nkrumah Interchange. He then proceeded to engage in a pedestrian comparison of the cost of projects, which has a different scope of works and specifications,” Mr Gyamfi said.

According to him, “This mischief which was peddled by no less a person than the Vice President of the Republic of Ghana, is shameful and reprehensible, to say the least.”

Mr Gyamfi explained that the Kwame Nkrumah Interchange project cost 74.8 million euros equivalent to $90 million at the time.

He said this fact is contained in the Parliamentary Hansard of 16th August 2012, when the transaction was approved by the 5th Parliament of Ghana, with the full participation and approval of the then NPP minority.

Explaining further, Mr Gyamfi stated that two years after the Kwame Interchange had been approved by Parliament and construction of the project commenced, the Mahama government on 1st October 2014 laid before Parliament another export credit facility for the design and construction of another project, the Ring Road Flyover, at a cost $170 million. This transaction was approved on 2nd October 2014 by the 6th Parliament of the Republic of Ghana.

“It is important to emphasize, that the two projects (the Kwame Nkrumah Interchange and the Ring Road Flyover) are distinct from each other and were separately approved by Parliament at different periods for different purposes,” he said adding that “The scope of work of the two projects are totally different, and so it is disingenuous and shameful for Dr Bawumia to lump the cost of the two projects together and create the impression that same is inflated.”

Mr Gyamfi called on Dr Bawumia to retract and apologise “for this lie which has further lowered his fast-sinking reputation and sullied his integrity and that of the high office he occupies.”