The 117.94-kilometre Bolgatanga-Bawku-Polimakom road will be ready and officially opened to traffic in December 2023.

The Upper East Regional Engineer of the Ghana Highway Authority (GHA), Philip Samini, disclosed this to President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo when he inspected ongoing construction works of the Kulaa Bridge in Bolgatanga last Friday. The bridge is part of the main project.

So far, 70 kilometres (km) of the €127 million road project has been completed and opened to traffic, while work is currently ongoing on the construction of three main bridges, namely the Kulaa Bridge, which is 30 per cent completed, the Tilli Bridge over the Red Volta, which is 80 per cent completed, and an additional one at Kobore over the White Volta, which is yet to commence.

Additionally, two bypasses will be constructed as part of the project through Bawku (15km) and Pusiga (6.9km).

That road passes through Bolgatanga Central, Bolgatanga East, Nabdam, Zebilla, Binduri, Bawku Central and Pusiga constituencies.

Tour

The President, who was on a day’s tour of the region, also commissioned the new Upper East Region water supply project in Navorongo, and inspected ongoing construction of an Agenda 111 hospital project at Katanga in the Bolgatanga East District.

President Akufo-Addo was accompanied on the tour by the Minister of Roads and Highways, Kwasi Amoako-Atta; the Minister of Defence, Dominic Nitiwul, and the Minister of Local Government, Decentralisation and Rural Development, Daniel K. Botwe, as well as the Upper East Regional Minister, Stephen Yakubu.

Mr Samini expressed the hope that the road project would be completed and handed over by the revised agreed date due to the commitment and dedication of the contractors towards the early completion of the project.

He said: “so far 70km of the road has been completed, which has enhanced movement on that stretch of the road, and the contractor is on the ground working hard to construct the three main bridges as part of the project”.

He added that although commuters hitherto used two hours to travel from Bolgatanga-Bawku, the construction of the road project had reduced the travel time to just an hour bringing huge relief to the road users”.

President Akufo-Addo expressed satisfaction with the progress of work so far done on the road project, as he waved at the workers at the bridge construction site while he went through the inspection process.

Background

The road project, which began in the latter part of 2016, was expected to be completed in two-and-half years.

However, contractors withdrew their equipment from the site for about a year due to the non-payment of arrears.

The preliminary contract sum for the project was pegged at GH¢613 million, but was later revised to €127 million.

Two construction firms — Mawums Construction Limited, a Ghanaian company, and Queiroz Galvao of Brazil — were awarded the contract.
The Ghanaian firm has already completed its part of the project.