ECONOMY: Gov’t secures $1bn of $3bn CDB loan

John Mahama - Veep

The Government of Ghana has secured US$ 1 billion of the much-talked about US$ 3 billion China Development Bank (CDB) loan at a signing ceremony in China today. 

Components (subsidiaries) of the $1 billion include the onshore and offshore pipeline as well as the gas processing plant all of which come under the Gas Infrastructure Project and the second component is the ICT platform for the surveillance of the Oil and Gas Infrastructure.

The two subsidiaries have been given Parliamentary approval and now that the funding has been secured works are likely to start soon. The total cost for the Gas Infrastructure Project is US$ 850 million and that of the ICT platform is the US$ 150 million both of which amount to US$1 billion - one-third of the total CDB loan.

In an interview with Citi FM’s presidential correspondent, Richard Mensah, who is with the Vice President, John Mahama and the government delegation in China, the Deputy Finance Minister, Seth Tekper, hinted that the remaining seven subsidiaries would be signed by the end of the month.

He said: “We’re going to have a meeting with CDB tomorrow to prepare a schedule for completion of the remaining seven that parliament approved before they went on recess and hopefully it is our expectation that this would be signed by the end of the month.”

“The essence of all this is that it paves the way for the disbursement to begin and for the project implementation fees to start for the job subsidiaries that were sent to parliament.”

Citifmonline.com