Nii Lante Vanderpuye, who chairs the Greater Accra caucus of the Minority, has threatened to organize a demonstration with La and Ga Mashie residents if the government omits funding for the La General Hospital from the 2024 budget.
During a parliamentary session in Accra on Tuesday, he stated that if the hospital is not included in the budget, the group will disrupt the parliamentary session until their demands are met.
He further added that the Minister of Health and the Minister of Finance will face further protests and disruptions in their ministries until the hospital is funded.
Meanwhile, Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu, the Majority Leader in Parliament, has attributed the delay in reconstructing the La General Hospital in Accra to the facility’s sponsors withholding funds.
In a statement to Parliament, Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu explained that the sponsors withheld the funds following Ghana’s engagement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
“Mr. Speaker, what has happened is that after the engagement with the IMF, funding from those sources that Parliament approved of, the funding has been withheld by the sponsors.”
“Mr. Speaker, until the nation is given a clean bill of health by the IMF, it is going to be difficult for the funding to be released. This is why the government now wants to situate it within the context of Agenda 111, and that will mean that the facility will have to be scaled down a bit,” Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu said.
The La General Hospital was demolished in July 2020 due to severe structural problems reported by the hospital’s administration.
President Akufo-Addo cut the sod for the commencement of construction of the La General Hospital Redevelopment Project on August 10, 2020, but work has yet to begin.
