Phase 2 of the Suame Interchange Project in Kumasi is now 87 per cent complete and is expected to open to traffic by the end of October this year, Roads and Highways Minister Governs Kwame Agbodza announced during an inspection of the project on Friday afternoon, as part of his working tour of the Ashanti Region.
The update marks the clearest completion timeline yet for a phase of the project that has moved through several revisions since work began in October 2022, and sets the stage for what Hon. Agbodza described as intensive work to follow on the interchange’s more complex first phase.
Phase 2 comprises three overpasses at Anomangye Junction, Magazine New Road Junction and Abusuakruwa Junction. The first two have been completed, while Abusuakruwa stands at 98.25 percent, effectively finished bar final touches.
Alongside the overpasses, the phase includes widening the Offinso Road, designated N10, into a two-by-three-lane dual carriageway, currently 77 percent complete. Separately, contractors have completed 13.2 of a planned 15 kilometres of local roads, with improvements to selected intersections also under way.
Hon. Agbodza said the completion and opening of Phase 2 is expected to improve traffic flow in the area, an outcome that would also clear the way for accelerated work on Phase 1.
A Project Reshaped by Funding and Design Changes
The Suame Interchange has followed a difficult path to this point. Awarded to Spain’s Grupo Dizmar and Ghana’s Rango Construction Limited at roughly $257 million under the previous NPP administration.
The project stalled after Ghana’s debt situation prevented the contractor from drawing down loan funds, alongside separate delays tied to relocating Ghana Water Company pipelines and outstanding compensation payments to affected residents.
Hon. Agbodza revised the original four-tier interchange design down to three tiers in February, a change he said followed shifting traffic projections after the government committed to building the Kumasi Outer Ring Road under the same Big Push programme.
He rejected criticism from the NPP’s Ashanti Caucus, which accused the government of downgrading the project, saying only the fourth-tier bridge had been eliminated because its expropriation costs no longer justified the design.
In April, the government announced payment of GH¢429.5m, equivalent to 29.5 million dollars, to the contractor working on the project and provision of an additional GH¢3 billion for the revised interchange, the outer ring road and associated works, with Hon. Agbodza stressing at the time that no funding had been removed from the project itself.
What Remains: Phase 1
Phase 1, the more demanding stage of the project, covers construction of the three-tier interchange at Suame itself, two further overpasses at Abrepo and Krofrom junctions, and the widening of the Eastern and Western Bypass roads.
As recently as March, officials put Phase 1 at only around 13 per cent complete, with the Ghana Water pipeline relocation around the roundabout area still unresolved.
Thursday’s inspection forms part of a broader tour Hon. Agbodza has undertaken through the Ashanti Region, following earlier visits this year to the Ejisu stretch of the Ring Road and the Santasi Roundabout to Ahodwo dual carriageway, where construction resumed after government cleared outstanding payments owed to contractors.
The Suame project sits within the government’s wider Big Push infrastructure programme, under which more than GH¢23 billion has been paid to road contractors nationwide as of mid-August, according to figures Agbodza has presented separately.
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