No gov’t can build 94 hospitals in one year – Sipa Yankey
Former Minister of Health, Dr. George Sipa-Adjah Yankey, has laughed off the announcement by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo that he will build 94 hospitals within a year.
The former Ghana Gas boss scoffed at the project, saying no government worth its salt could do so within one year.
“It is not feasible,” he emphasised.
He said the procurement process alone for that huge number of hospitals took over a year.
Speaking on TV3’s ‘Hot Issues’, Dr. Sipah Yankey, argued that “to begin to build a hospital doesn’t take one year.”
During his seventh address to the nation, President Akufo-Addo said coronavirus had exposed the vulnerability of the country’s healthcare system. To ensure that underserved districts and regions in the country had a hospital, he announced an ambitious plan to build 94 hospitals within a year.
Eighty-eight out of those will be 100-bed hospitals in districts which do not have district hospitals, while six will be built as regional hospitals for the newly created regions.
But Dr Sipa Yankey said even securing a loan facility for such a project would take some time.
“Because of these processes to go through, it cannot be possible for any government or anybody to build 88 district hospitals within one year,” he stressed.
He had earlier admonished the government to rather expend on the numerous uncompleted health projects dotted around the country, saying it is “obligatory” to do so.
“Any asset of this country belongs to all of us. It doesn’t belong to the NDC, NPP or to any individual.
“So if we apply taxpayer’s money to build an infrastructure and the infrastructure is not finished before one government comes into power, it is obligatory for that government to continue.”
He considered the continuation of projects at different stages of completion much easier than starting new projects.