The government through the Ministry of Finance is financing about 10,000 ongoing road projects across the country valued at GH?135 billion. So far, the Ministry says it has paid an amount of GH?60 billion as arrears on the projects with GH?10 billion being paid this year alone. Madam Eva Mends, the Chief Director at the Ministry of Finance, made this known when she spoke at a high-level expert panel discussion on the theme, 'Closing the financing gap in road infrastructure development in Ghana'. The event was organised by the Ghana Highway Authority with the support of the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Roads and Highways as part of activities to mark its 50th anniversary celebration. It has an objective of addressing the persist challenge of securing sustainable financing for road infrastructure development and maintenance. She said despite efforts to promote prudent public sector financial management through the introduction of the certificate of commencement policy and the Government Integrat ed Financial Management System (GIFMIS), some of those projects which had been ongoing for years were awarded on the blind side of the ministry therefore without budgetary allocations. 'Ministry of Roads and Highways will go ahead and make a commitment, sign a contract. Most of the time, we are not even privy to the contract. And that's something; a systemic issue we will need to address,' she said. In most instances, she observed that contracts signed had no limitations on how much could be expended and executed, thereby allowing contractors who could mobilise resources to execute projects beyond the agreed budget. She said, the situation had created delayed payments to contractors which in effect attracted interest and did not guarantee value for money. 'There's no way we can pay for all those projects in three years, even if we don't award any contract this year. If we don't award any contract for the next three years, we still will not be able to pay on time all the contracts that we currently have on our books,' she said. Naa Dr Alhassan Andani, Former Chief Executive Officer of Stanbic Bank and the Paramount Chief of Pishigu, said it was a step in the right direction for government to admit that it could not finance all the road projects in the country. He called for the policy sustainability and the prioritisation of payments to attract the private sector in the road infrastructure sector. He also highlighted the need for a master plan which entailed the classification of roads based on their viability to help in prioritisation and arranging the appropriate financing models. These classifications, he said, should include social roads which are demanded by constituents and could be financed by citizens, financial roads that are viable and attractive to the financial sector and economic roads, thus those with long-term financial viability and had economic benefits that were not easily quantifiable. Mr Kwaku Kwarteng, Member of Parliament for Obuasi West, asked politicians and the media to help manage the road expectations of constituents, especially during the election period. Source : Ghana News Agency