Deputy Lands Minister Calls for Urgent Action to Save "Going to Waste" Sports Facilities Across Ghana

Deputy Minister for Lands and Natural Resources, Hon. Alhaji Yusif Sulemana, has called for urgent measures to save the country’s sports facilities, warning that infrastructure like the Bortman Stadium is “more or less going to waste.”

Contributing to a debate in Parliament on the Report of the Public Accounts Committee on the Follow-up Report of the Auditor-General on three audits — Regulating Small-Scale Mining for a Sustainable Environment, Sustainability of Sports Stadia in Ghana, and Administration of Scholarships by GETFund — Mr. Sulemana, who is also MP for Bole-Bamboi, expressed concern over the deteriorating state of sports infrastructure.

“I was amazed to see grasses overgrown and the facility more or less going to waste,” he said. “If this was for an individual, if this was for a private organisation, would you leave it this way?”

The Deputy Minister noted that public funds used to build stadiums and sports facilities could have been used for schools, hospitals and clinics.

“It is our own moneys. Yet we thought that sports is a very important thing to do. And so for us to invest this much money into this area and allow it to go rotten is something that I think we have to take a second look at.”

He urged managers of stadiums across the country to “wake up” and proposed two options: government must devote more money to maintenance, or find ways to commercialise the facilities so they can generate funds to sustain themselves.

“Most often when we talk about these things here, when we leave here nothing happens,” Mr. Sulemana said. “I think that the time has come for us to speak the truth and tell those responsible to do what is needful.”