The Speaker of Parliament, Alban Bagbin, has admitted a motion to probe the National Cathedral Project. This followed a Private Members’ Motion sponsored by Minority Leader, Cassiel Ato Forson and Deputy Minority Leader, Emmanuel Armah-Kofi Buah, among others.
The motion will see a committee constituted “to conduct an inquiry into the National Cathedral of Ghana project and all related matters.” The committee will subsequently make recommendations for the House’s consideration.
Other National Democratic Congress (NDC) legislators who backed the motion include, Minority Chief Whip Kwame Governs Agbodza, Bolgatanga East Member of Parliament; Dr Dominic Ayine, Krachi West Member of Parliament; Helen Ntoso and North Tongu Member of Parliament; Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa.
The development comes about a month after two eminent clergymen and members of the Board of Trustees of the controversial National Cathedral project, called for its immediate suspension and a financial audit undertaken. The two – Archbishop Duncan Williams and Rev Eastwood Anaba, said their call is based on the controversies surrounding the project.
According to them, the suspension will pave the way for transparency and accountability to be provided to the Ghanaian people. The National Cathedral Project, has been one of the most controversial public issues, since the project was first announced by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo.
Apart from questions of accountability which have been repeatedly raised by the Minority in Parliament, there have also been concerns about the relevance of the project, in the face of the country’s economic crisis. Amidst the plethora of issues, founder of the Light House Chapel International, Bishop Dag Heward-Mills, resigned from the Cathedral’s Board of Trustee in August 2022.
In so doing, the preacher did not assign any specific reason for his departure; leaving the public to rely on their own conjectures and speculations about why the celebrated man of God, left the scene.
Meanwhile, President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, has on numerous occasions stated that he will build the National Cathedral, regardless of the opposition from the public.
Secretary of The Boards’ Face Off With Ablakwa
The Secretary of the Board, Rev Victor Kusi Boateng, has also been accused on conflict of interests, regarding some expenditure in the project’s execution.
The secretary to the Board, received his share of troubles pertaining to the National Cathedral, when the Honorable Member of Parliament for North Tongu Constituency, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, deliberately accused him of fraud.
According to records made available by the North Tongu Member of Parliament, the embattled clergyman is registered in Cathedral incorporation credentials as Victor Kusi Boateng, yet his diplomatic passport bears the name, Kwabena Adu Gyamfi.
Deputy Minority Leader, Emmanuel Armah Kofi Buah, has said that the Secretary to the Board of Trustees of the National Cathedral of Ghana, Reverend Victor Kusi Boateng, escaped from his own suit against North Tongu Member of Parliament.
Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, specified that we dwell in a country where parliamentarians carrying out their constitutional oversight mandate, become victims of state sponsored harassment, strange court injunctions, judicial threats of imprisonment, even as double identity charlatans were protected and pampered, was definitely a mark of a nation in the dark abyss.
These back and forth between the people, the Members of Parliament and the National Cathedral project, has urged Board Members to the National Cathedral, to seek for a suspension of the project, enabling a thorough financial audit and providing accountability to the people of Ghana.
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