We will revamp all defunct factories – Mahama

President John Dramani Mahama on Sunday reassured the chiefs and people of the Upper East Region that the Government would revamp all defunct factories in the region to help create jobs for the youth if given another mandate.

The President made the promise when he met with the chiefs and elders of the Bolgatanga Traditional Council during a campaign visit to the region to solicit for the renewal of his mandate. 

He said a feasibility study would be conducted on all the defunct factories established by the first President of Ghana, Dr Kwame Nkrumah, to revamp those that were viable as stated in the Manifesto of the National Democratic Congress (NDC).

President Mahama said the Kumasi Shoe and the Komenda Sugar factories were among some of the defunct factories which had been revamped and were creating jobs as part of the re-engendering process. 

President Mahama said the second tranche of funds to help procure equipment for the new Upper East Regional Hospital in Bolgatanga, which is almost complete, had been released and the facility would serve as a referral hospital just like the Tamale, Komfo Anokye and Korle-Bu Teaching hospitals.  

“The facility, which will have the latest modern equipment, will help fast-track and reduce the cost of patients travelling for long distances to major health facilities in Kumasi and Accra for treatment,” the President said.

He said the Government, during its four-year tenure of office, had provided unprecedented development projects all over the regions without discrimination.

On the health front, he said the Government had built a lot of regional and district hospitals including over 1,600 CHIPS Compounds.  

President Mahama said as promised by the Government, 123 Community Senior High schools would be built across deprived communities in the country.

He said 42 of them had been completed and were operational whilst 72 of them would be completed by the close of the year. 

The President re-assured the people that work on the Bolgatanga-Bawku road would soon begin as the Government had secured funding for it.

He said the region would also get its fair share of a standard airport and a sports stadium just like the other regions to boost economic activities and urged the electorate to retain the NDC in government to deliver more projects.  

“There is no history in Ghana that a government ever constructed more roads and other infrastructural development like this government. We are concentrating on asphalting majority of the roads in the regional townships in the country so that in the next government we will focus more on the feeder roads,” he said.

He commended the Bolgatanga Traditional Council for working hard to settle the chieftaincy issue in the region and indicated that the government would not interfere in any chieftaincy issue but would help ensure law and order for the people to conduct their business smoothly.

Naba Johnson Awuni, the President of the Bolgatanga Traditional Council, commended the President and the Government for the appreciable level of development in the region and appealed to him to fast-track the revamping of the defunct factories including the Pwalugu Tomato, Meat, and Cotton factories and the rice meal.

Naba Awuni appealed to President Mahama to help resolve the perennial late arrival of School Feeding Grants to the senior high schools in the region as well as speed up the acquisition of equipment for the new regional hospital.

Source: GNA