Works at Sunyani Airport abandoned again as government fails to pay contractor

The ongoing rehabilitation works at the Sunyani Airport in the Bono Region has been abandoned again.

Resources Access Limited (RAL), the contractor working on the expansion of the runway has not been paid for several months by the Government of Ghana.

The rehabilitation works were supposed to have been completed at the end of May but that did not happen due to debts.

In March 2021, the Transport Minister, Kwaku Ofori Asiamah visited the airport and promised that the rehabilitation works would be completed at the end of May 2021.

The project is still not completed due to failed promises.

Information available to this reporter reveals that the contractor has threatened to remove all equipment from the site if government fails to honour its part of the deal.

The company according to sources has written letters to the appropriate authorities to that effect. It added that RAL for several months has also not paid its workers because of the situation.

In 2020 the then Deputy Minister of Aviation, Yaw Afful during one of his working tours of the airport promised the rehabilitation works would be completed in December 2020 but failed to meet the timeline.

On June 25, 2019, government signed a contract agreement with Messrs Resources Access Limited (RAL) for the Rehabilitation of the Sunyani Airport at an estimated cost of ¢48,694,733.69. The consultant to the project is Engineering Services Provision Company Limited (ESPCo).

DAA Construction which was responsible for the construction of the fence wall at the airport has completed its works. The project, with a nine-month timeline, was expected to have commenced on October 25, 2019 and completed on July 24, 2020.

However, the contract period was revised, making the duration seventeen months. The project is expected to be completed by end of May, 2021.

Efforts to speak to authorities on the issue were unsuccessful before this publication.