Your SONA 2022 failed to address Ghanaians’ plight – Minority Leader

Haruna Iddrisu, the Minority Leader, has stated that President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-State Addo’s of the Nation Address (SONA) for 2022, presented in Parliament on March 30, did not reflect Ghanaians’ hardship.

“We expected him to give the genuine status of the nation, reflecting the hardship of the people,” Mr Iddirsu added, seconding the move to end the meeting after the President had delivered his message. Unfortunately, he lacks the courage to speak about the economy.”

In his speech, President Akufo-Addo mentioned that the made-in-Ghana label is being stamped on a wide range of products proudly manufactured in Ghana as part of the One District One Factory Initiative (1D1F).

One hundred and sixty-six (106) factories are currently operational, one hundred and forty-eight (148) are under construction, and twenty-four (24) projects are in the mobilization stage, according to him, out of a total of 278 1D1F projects at various stages of implementation in all sixteen (16) regions.

“Mr. Speaker, to bring the youth on board the 1D1F Programme, fifty-eight (58) of the two hundred and eight (278) 1D1F Projects have been created as firms entirely owned by youth groups, with direct government assistance,” he stated. Between forty (40) and fifty (50) young people are stockholders in each of these 1D1F Youth enterprises.

“In addition, five (5) medium scale state-of-the-art agro-processing Common-User Facilities (CUFs) have been established with direct support from Government and are owned by various groups of farmers, whose farming operations had previously been undermined through lack of processing facilities. These farmer-owned companies have been established in five (5) Districts, namely Dormaa West, Savelugu, Sefwi Akontonbra, Sekyere Central and Tarkwa Nsuaem. They cover oil palm processing, rice milling and the processing of maize into maize grits.

“Mr. Speaker, quite a number of global vehicle manufacturing companies have set up assembly plants here in our country, and started producing vehicles for our market and for the West African market. The well-defined Ghana Automotive Development Policy we outdoored in August 2019 has facilitated this welcome development.

“Since June 2021, Toyota and Suzuki brands of vehicles are being produced here, commencing with the production of Hilux Pickup and Swift models. VW and Sinotruck, which commenced commercial operations in 2020, have continued to assemble their brands of vehicles and are enjoying significant local patronage.

“In addition, a new state-of-the-art assembly plant with capacity to assemble 5,000 new vehicles per annum has been established by Nissan in Tema, which is currently producing Nissan and Peugeot brands of vehicles for the Ghanaian and West African markets. I will have the pleasure to commission this new plant in Tema tomorrow. Three other vehicle manufacturers, namely KIA, Hyundai and Renault are also expected to commence commercial production this year.

“Our national iconic automobile brand, the Kantanka brand produced by Kantanka Automobile Company Ltd., also stepped-up production of its made-in-Ghana vehicles which include Nkunimdie SUV, Omama Pickup, Onantefo 4×4 Pickup, Otumfuo SUV and K71 Small SUV models.”