National Cathedral: The whole arrangement is based on illegalities, lack of forthrightness – Ablakwa

The Member of Parliament for the North Tongu constituency, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa has described the structure of the national cathedral project as having flaws and a lack of proper accountability.

He said the irregularities were one too many and were not being addressed by government.

Speaking on Joy News’ ‘The Probe’ on June 12, he stated that, monies were being taken from the consolidated fund for the cathedral at a tune of a whooping GHS200 million, which is unconstitutional.

Mr Ablakwa who is a Ranking Member on the Foreign Affairs Committee said, records available show that the executive director of the cathedral secretariat is listed as an employee at the presidency implying that, he is being paid with taxpayers' money.

“Public funds, no matter which sector is spending it, be it the presidency, ministers, nobody is exempt and nobody is above the laws of our country and that’s why we have been asking, who authorized this money and what is your legal basis for going into the consolidated fund and drawing out such huge sums of money. This whole thing is so murky.

“When you go through the list of the board of trustees, this gentleman here, the Executive Director of the Secretariat, which has been presented as a private entity, Dr. Paul Opoku Mensah, will you believe if I tell you that when you go through the list of presidential staffers, which the President provided parliament, you go to page 15 item 96 and Dr. Paul Opoku Mensah is here as National Cathedral Overseer, that is his position. Why is the Ghanaian taxpayer paying someone who works for a private board of trustees? It is wrong,” he expressed gravely.

He asserted that, if an entity was being kept private, then its structure should be done in such a manner, but “you see a very confused government. You say you have a private board of trustees, but Ghanaian people are paying for the executive board of directors.”

He emphasized that even though, government had set up the cathedral as a private entity, it was not able to ascertain if the National Cathedral is private or public.