President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has described the timelines given for the completion of the Agenda 111 projects as ambitious.
The President stated that identifying appropriate locations around the country to situate the projects became more difficult than earlier anticipated.
But, delivering the 2022 State of the Nation Address in Parliament on Wednesday (30 March), President Akufo-Addo said he is determined to complete the projects before he leaves office in 2025.
“We are undertaking the construction of 111 entities, which comprise standard 100-bed district hospitals for one hundred and one (101) districts without hospitals, with accommodation for doctors and nurses; six (6) new regional hospitals for each of the six (6) new regions; the rehabilitation of the Effia-Nkwanta Hospital in the Western Region; one (1) new regional hospital for the Western Region; and three (3) psychiatric hospitals for each of the three (3) zones of the country, i.e. North, Middle and Coastal,” he said.
An ambitious project that comes with job creation
“Agenda 111 is an ambitious project, which must and will be done, and which will create some thirty-three thousand, nine hundred (33,900) jobs for construction workers, and, on completion, some thirty-four thousand, three hundred (34,300) jobs for health workers.
“…Mr Speaker, I have to report that, like all major construction projects, it is evident that the initial schedule we gave for the completion of Agenda 111 was overly ambitious. Identifying suitable sites around the country, for example, has turned out to be even more problematic than had been anticipated. I am able to say that a great deal of the preparatory work has now been completed, and work has started at eighty-seven (87) of the one hundred and eleven (111) sites. I have been assured that preliminary work on the remaining twenty-four (24) sites is ongoing.
“…We have every intention of seeing this project through to a successful end, which will enable me to commission all one hundred and eleven (111) hospitals before I leave office on 7th January 2025,” he added.
