Features
Abandoned projects: Ghana’s monument to neglect (Part 3)
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In many communities in Ghana, hope for development is like a good breakfast but a bad supper. Projects start very enthusiastically and continue at breakneck speed, evoking great joy.
With bated breath, the beneficiary communities believe that the next big thing is about to happen for them. They think that the eel’s hope of becoming a whale is about to materialise.
But their expectations are dashed before long. The projects are halted, and their hope of landing a dream project proves to be, after all, a mere dream.
These projects are what I call Ghana’s monument to neglect, a phenomenon that is a very damning indictment of the failures of successive governments.
The first part of this article featured the $200 million Saglemi Affordable Housing Project at Prampram in the Greater Accra Region comprising 5,000 residential units.
The NDC initiated it, completed 1,500 units, and handed them over to the NPP government but none has been allocated because the NPP suspects malfeasance in the deal.
Last week, the KNUST Teaching Hospital project at Boadi, near the university’s main campus took centre stage. The project was begun in 2008 to train more health professionals, bridge the gap between the demand and supply of critically needed staff, and ease the pressure on the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital.
But lack of funds left it abandoned for over a decade until work resumed recently. The first phase is expected to be completed in October this year.
In this final instalment, the white elephant in focus is the $2.4 million Youth Sports Centre project at Ho in the Volta Region, comprising a FIFA standard football pitch, an eight-lane athletic track, tennis, basketball, and handball courts among other facilities.
The 10,000-seater project took off in March 2018 and was due to be completed in February 2019 but, reports say it has been abandoned midway.
A press release circulated in February by the NDC said the project site had become a grazing field for cattle and a hunting ground for grasscutter.
Even bigger neglected projects abound but were not prioritised in this article, either because they have been resumed or have been shelved.
Among the resumed projects is the $180 million state-of-the-art, 500-bed capacity military hospital at Afari in the Atwima-Nwabiagya District of the Ashanti Region.
Conceived in 2008 by former President J. A. Kufuor and approved by Parliament in November the same year, the original site was Sofoline in Kumasi.
But a protracted dispute caused the location to be changed three times, from Sofoline, to Tamale after the NDC came to power in 2008, to the 37 Military Hospital before finally landing at Afari.
For six whole years, it got stalled until 2014, when the land at Afari was prepared for actual work to start in 2015. In fact, a sod was cut at the 37 Military Hospital in Accra and work began before further bickering finally relocated the facility to Afari.
The work in Accra had to be stopped but not without great cost. The contract stipulated that if the site changed, the contractor must be compensated. The company demanded about $36 million but the Government negotiated and reduced it to $19 million. The Government hesitated in paying and the contractor slowed down work, further delaying the project.
Thus, due to somebody’s thoughtless negligence, crass laxity, gross dereliction of duty, and lack of due diligence, we had to cough up a whopping $19 million in punitive cost. That money could have been used to provide eight regions with the type of youth centre designed for Ho.
Indications are that all the physical infrastructure such as the administration block, staff quarters, medical and surgical blocks, have been completed. Installation of equipment is on-going with inauguration anticipated to be in December this year.
Another category of deprioritised stalled projects deals with those which suffered a stillbirth, those that were dead on arrival. One such project that would have been a game-changer is the aborted $2.6 billion sky train project, an elevated railway system spanning 194 kilometres with a capacity to transport 400,000 passengers per year within Accra.
At independence in 1957, the population of the capital, Accra, was just 250,000 but it has exploded to its current level of over six million. The project, was, therefore, expected to decongest traffic drastically in the city, boost economic activity and reduce pollution due to unhealthy vehicular fumes.
Most of the works such as the fabrication and construction were to be done in Ghana to create about 5,000 jobs for Ghanaians during the implementation phase scheduled to begin by January 2020.
The South African investment partners, Ai SkyTrain Consortium, were said to have conducted feasibility studies at their own expense to kickstart the project, paving the way for the signing of an agreement on Thursday, November 8, 2018, in Johannesburg, South Africa.
Ghana’s Railway Development Minister at the time, Mr. Joe Ghartey, signed for the country, saying: “The economics of this project are good. We are very excited about the prospects,” with President Nana Akufo Addo by his side.
All was set for the project to start in earnest, but, alas, that was not to be. Mr. Peter Amewu, the new railways minister argued that the project was too expensive.
Can you believe that after all the fanfare and economic benefits, the same government chickened out of the deal because of the cost? Are we serious? If not now, when? Some people would argue that given the dire straits in which Ghana finds herself, the new minister was right. I beg to differ.
A wealthy Nigerian, Mr. Omololu Onabanjo, who graciously hosted me while I was on a visit to his country some time ago, told me, with some anguish in his voice: “Tony, Africa has a long way to go.”
I kept pondering over his statement thinking that because he schooled in the UK for a long time, he had become so anglicised as to despise his own continent.
After a while, he came back to me and said: “Listen, I have thought about what I told you and I have realised that we don’t have anywhere to go.”
Clarifying his point, he said: “The people we are chasing are out of sight. They negotiated the development curve ahead of us a long time ago. We don’t see their back. How then can we follow them to where they have reached?”
Who said we are broke? The simple truth is that we cannot eat our cake and have it. When we do not prioritise and cut our coat according to our size, where do we expect to get the money to fund a capital-intensive but ultimately profitable venture like the sky train project?
When we waste money uselessly on emoluments, a situation worsened by bureaucratic obesity, how can we prioritise feasible projects like the Ho youth sports centre? If we scrap ex-gratia alone, we can build such centres in all the regional capitals.
If you will not do it, do not promise on your honour to do it. Do not build castles in the air. If you cannot complete it, do not start it at all and waste our scarce resources.
But, if it is a game-changer like the sky train, why chicken out? If we fail to take bold and pragmatic steps to develop our country now, we would continue to linger far behind while others reach for the stars as Mr. Onabanjo said.
Where was Singapore when Ghana was blossoming under the inspiring leadership of Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah? Now, Singapore which gained its independence in 1965, eight years after Ghana’s, is the richest country in Asia and among the world’s top ten economies in terms of its GDP per capita. It is the only Asian country to attain a higher per capita GDP than the US by every measure.
It took a combination of free enterprise, social interventions like quality mass education, affordable healthcare, cheap transportation, capital accumulation not dissipation, and strong-willed leadership by Lee Kuan Yew to transform Singapore into the economic power it is today.
One time he told his people without mincing words that he was on a mission, and anyone who would withstand him, would have himself to blame.
That is what I call leadership. Paul Kigame of Rwanda is manifesting similar traits despite the political turmoil and the disruptions of war he inherited.
With his no-nonsense style and refusal to be pushed around by any Western godfather, he is doing for his country what Nkrumah wanted to do for Ghana.
Akufo Addo must take a cue from Nkrumah and Kagame and transform Ghana into the haven she is destined to be. He must not just hire; he must begin to fire as well.
By Tony Prempeh
Contact: teepeejubilee@yahoo.co.uk
“A woman who abandons her baby in a dustbin at Kasoa Lorry Station is not always a wicked woman. Sometimes, she is a wounded woman whose mind has broken, whose family has rejected her, and whose society has left her with only one terrible option: disappear or be disgraced.”
That is the hard truth Ghana must hear.
In the last 10 days alone, our nation has been confronted with the same painful headline, twice.
Case 1 – Kasoa Main Lorry Station, Central Region: A newborn baby girl was found abandoned inside a dustbin at the public toilet of the Kasoa Main Station. A woman who went to use the facility discovered the infant and raised an alarm. Commercial drivers and bystanders quickly retrieved the baby and rushed her to the Kasoa Polyclinic for emergency medical care.
Case 2 – Asante Bekwai, Ashanti Region: On Thursday morning, August 20, 2026, a two-week-old neonate was reportedly abandoned by an unknown nursing mother at Bekwai in the Ashanti Region. Residents who came across the child raised the alarm. The baby was admitted to the Bekwai Government Hospital as police commenced investigations.
Let me be clear from the start: Newborn abandonment is wrong. It is dangerous. It is criminal. And it can kill. This article does not excuse it. But if we only arrest and shame, we will never stop it. We must treat the root, not just punish the fruit.
What exactly is newborn abandonment? – The two definitions
The Legal Definition: Under Ghana’s Criminal Offences Act, 1960 (Act 29), Section 96, and the Children’s Act, 1998 (Act 560), abandonment of a child under 12 years is a criminal offence. It is classified as exposure and abandonment, punishable as a misdemeanor or felony. The law sees the mother as a perpetrator.
The Psychological definition: In clinical textbooks, newborn abandonment is defined as the intentional, permanent relinquishment of all parental rights, care, and responsibilities over an infant within the first 28 days of life without making formal, legal arrangements for care.
To understand this crisis properly, we must not confuse it with child abandonment. Newborn abandonment happens within 0-28 days of life, often driven by acute panic, denial of pregnancy, or postpartum psychosis where the attachment bond never formed. Child abandonment, on the other hand, involves toddlers to teenagers where a bond existed but collapsed over time due to chronic poverty, family breakdown, or parental burnout. One is an acute crisis of the first month; the other is a chronic breakdown over years. Both are harmful, but they need different interventions.
Psychologically, newborn abandonment is the ultimate rupture of the primary attachment bond. Think of a 19-year-old university student who secretly gives birth alone in her hostel room, wraps the crying baby in a polythene bag, and drops it at a refuse dump at midnight. That is not just a crime scene; it is a scene of extreme panic and psychological dissociation.
Why would a mother carry a baby for 9 months and then abandon it?
This is the question every Ghanaian asks. If you wanted to abandon it, why not abort? The answer is deeply psychological:
1. The psychodynamics of denial of pregnancy: This is a profound defense mechanism, not a lie. The mother’s subconscious mind completely rejects the reality of the pregnancy. She does not gain weight normally, feels no kicks, does not seek antenatal care, and genuinely convinces herself she is not pregnant until sudden, shocking labour pains take her by surprise in a toilet or bedroom.
2. Fantasy of a dissolving problem: This is called cognitive avoidance. She believes “my boyfriend will come back,” “my mother will forgive me,” or “something miraculous will happen before birth.” So she waits, paralyzed, until the baby is here.
3. Barriers to safe abortion: Deep religious guilt, moral anxiety, fear of dying from a back-alley abortion, lack of money for a safe procedure, and family laws force her to carry to term even when she feels incapable.
4. The shock of reality and acute panic: Upon delivery, the physical presence and crying of the newborn shatters all denial. Confronted with immediate exposure, shame, and reality, her brain enters a trauma response — “fight, flight, or freeze.” For many, it becomes “flight” — physically escape the threat of exposure to survive socially. That is why babies are left in places where others will find them -lorry stations, churches, hospitals.
Source:
Counselor Prince Offei, CPAC’s founder, is a leading Mental Health Professional, Marriage Counsellor, Author, ADR Expert/Arbitrator, and Spectator Newspaper Columnist. He writes on relationships, marriage, parenting, special needs support, and their connection to mental health. For therapy, counselling, or enquiries, contact Counselor Prince & Associates Consult (CPAC) in Accra on 0559850604 / 0551428486.
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Features
Environmental stewardship is an act of worship: The Islamic response to climate change, environmental degradation (Part 4)
The environmental consequences of illegal mining have reached alarming levels in Ghana. Several major rivers, including the Pra, Ankobra, Offin, Birim and Tano, have experienced significant pollution from illegal mining activities, increasing the cost and complexity of water treatment while threatening the availability of potable water for millions of citizens (Water Resources Commission, 2024; Ghana Water Limited, 2024). These developments underscore the urgent need for stronger environmental governance and collective action.
Islam equally emphasises accountability in governance. The Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) taught that every leader is responsible for those under his or her authority (Sahih al-Bukhari, Hadith 7138; Sahih Muslim, Hadith 1829). This principle extends to public officials entrusted with environmental regulation, traditional authorities responsible for communal lands, mining companies, local assemblies, and community leaders. Environmental protection cannot succeed
where accountability is absent.
At the same time, addressing galamsey requires more than law enforcement. Sustainable solutions must tackle the underlying socio-economic realities that drive individuals into illegal mining. Many young people are motivated by unemployment, poverty, and limited economic opportunities. Islamic principles of social justice therefore call for the creation of alternative livelihoods through sustainable agriculture, vocational training, responsible small-scale mining under strict environmental standards, entrepreneurship, and skills development. Environmental protection and economic empowerment should not be viewed as competing priorities but as complementary goals that promote human dignity and national development.
Faith communities also have an indispensable role to play. Mosques, churches, schools, traditional councils, and civil society organisations possess significant influence in shaping public attitudes and behaviours. Imams, in particular, should consistently remind congregations that wealth acquired through actions that destroy communities and Allah’s creation cannot be regarded as a blessing. Religious education should cultivate environmental ethics alongside spiritual devotion, reinforcing the understanding that protecting rivers, forests, and farmlands is an expression of gratitude to Allah and a fulfilment of the trust of Khalifah.
Ultimately, the struggle against galamsey is more than a campaign to protect natural resources; it is a struggle to uphold justice, preserve human dignity, and honour the trust that Allah has placed upon humanity. Lasting solutions will require strong governance, responsible citizenship, sustainable economic opportunities, and renewed moral leadership. Only when these elements
work together can Ghana safeguard its natural heritage for present and future generations.
Water conservation, waste management and sustainable development: Practical expressions of Islamic stewardship
Religious education should cultivate environmental ethics alongside spiritual devotion, reinforcing the understanding that protecting rivers, forests, and farmlands is an expression of gratitude to Allah and a fulfilment of the trust of Khalifah.
Ultimately, the struggle against galamsey is more than a campaign to protect natural resources; it is a struggle to uphold justice, preserve human dignity, and honour the trust that Allah has placed upon humanity. Lasting solutions will require strong governance, responsible citizenship, sustainable economic opportunities, and renewed moral leadership. Only when these elements
work together can Ghana safeguard its natural heritage for present and future generations.
Islam is not merely a religion that condemns environmental destruction; it also provides practical guidance for preserving and sustaining the natural world. Through its teachings on moderation, cleanliness, conservation, and responsible consumption, Islam cultivates an environmental ethic that remains remarkably relevant to contemporary challenges such as water scarcity, pollution, waste management, and climate change. These teachings encourage Muslims to become
responsible custodians of Allah’s creation in both private and public life.
Water conservation: A sacred responsibility
Water occupies a unique position in Islam as the source of life and an essential element of worship. Allah says, “And We made from water every living thing. Then will they not believe?” (Qur’an 21:30, Sahih International). This verse reminds believers that water is not merely an economic resource but a divine blessing upon which all living creatures depend. The importance of water is further reflected in Islamic acts of worship. Muslims perform ablution (wudu) before the five daily prayers and ritual bathing (ghusl) under prescribed circumstances.
Yet, despite its central role in purification, Islam strongly discourages wastefulness. The Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) once advised one of his companions not to waste water while performing ablution, even when using water from a flowing river (Sunan Ibn Majah, Hadith 425). This timeless guidance establishes the principle that abundance does not justify extravagance.
Conservation remains a religious obligation regardless of the apparent availability of natural resources.
This Prophetic teaching carries profound implications for contemporary Ghana. Illegal mining has severely polluted many rivers, increasing the cost of water treatment and limiting access to safe drinking water for numerous communities. Climate change has also intensified seasonal variability in rainfall, placing additional pressure on freshwater resources (IPCC, 2023). Against this
backdrop, conserving water is no longer simply an environmental preference—it is a moral imperative grounded in Islamic teaching.
Water conservation should therefore become a shared responsibility among households, educational institutions, industries, and places of worship. Simple practices such as repairing leaking pipes, harvesting rainwater, protecting riverbanks, avoiding contamination of water bodies, and promoting efficient irrigation contribute to safeguarding one of Allah’s greatest blessings. Every effort to preserve water is an investment in public health, food security, and the
wellbeing of future generations.
Unfortunately, indiscriminate disposal of refuse remains a significant challenge in many communities. Plastic waste clogs drainage systems, contributes to flooding during the rainy season, pollutes rivers and beaches, and threatens marine ecosystems. Open burning of waste further degrades air quality and poses serious health risks, particularly for children and the elderly (UNEP,2024).
The author is Chief Imam of Katamanso Municipal and Certified Counsellor and Governnace Expert.
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