A private Legal Practitioner and a staunch member of the National Democratic Congress, Lawyer Edudzi Tamakloe, believes payments made to Sir David Adjaye on the architectural design of the national cathedral sound fishy.
He accuses the government of making these payments to Sir. David Adjaye without proper recourse to the law.
But the government believes it has not erred in not detailing the GH¢32 million to Sir. David Adjaye and Associates for consultancy on the National Cathedral in the budget.
A Deputy Minister for Finance, Hon. John Kumah told the media last week that the government had given enough clarity on state funding of the cathedral.
“Even though it may not be captured as a budget item because it is not under any specific MDA, it can form part of government expenditure as long as we have captured in the budget that we were going to provide seed funding,” he explained.
But speaking on Okay FM’s Ade Akye Abia program, the legal practitioner, who is an aide to the former president John Dramani Mahama, said he could not fathom why payments have been made to the architectural designer though works on the cathedral have not been completed.
Lawyer Godwin Edudzie Tamakloe appeared a bit worried about the sole sourcing tender process through which Mr. David Ajaye was awarded the said contract.
“in a letter circulating in the media space and signed by the chief of staff, I notice that the Public Procurement Authority was instructed to allow a sole sourcing contract to be granted to Sir David Adjaye, which clearly was in sharp contradiction of procurement laws in this country.
“Where did we go wrong as a country that we will have to break our own laws to satisfy our family and friends?” he quizzed.
He added that building a cathedral for him isn’t a bad idea, but the government can appeal to Ghanaians to donate at least 100 ghana cedis to the building of the cathedral.
“But the funny thing is Christians are not even willing to donate to the building of the cathedral, which will serve as a more diligent purpose for them than any other religious group in the country.”