Minority tackles trade minister over missing GHS 207m in 1D1F allocation

The Minority Group in Parliament has raised a red flag over discrepancies in the account of One District, One Factory (1D1F) allocations.

According to the National Democratic Congress (NDC) lawmakers, the account of the 1D1F allocations presented by the Ministry of Trade and Industry doesn’t add up.

In a press conference in Accra, the minority alleges that about GHS 207 million cannot be accounted for in the final accounts provided by the Ministry.

“So we are asking the Ministry that we will need the names of the banks and the names of each of the companies as well as the amount each and every company has taken. Initially, the Ministry said it will take some time for them to get these documents. They dragged it and finally they brought us the list of the banks with the names of the companies and the amounts. We insisted that without that we will not approve their budget,” he explained.

He continued that “We finally got that report this morning. Unfortunately, the Ministry was unable to account out of the 269 million loans given to the banks. The Ministry was only able to account for GHC62,281,484.29 million what it means is that a total amount of GHC207,407, 899 have not been accounted for. In other words that amount as far as we are concern is missing.”

“It is important that the press and the people of Ghana take interest in this matter, and the Minister in the helm of affairs the Hon. Alan Kyerematen must come clean to the people of Ghana to explain where the amount of GHC207,407, 899 to basically de-risk these loans to one district one factory is.”

The Minority further explained that the Ministry said GHC2.69 billion in loans has been given to one district-one factory adding that currently 106 of these factories are in operation with a projection that by the end of this year 2021 the number will move 248 factories.

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