The Minister of State, Local Government and Rural Development, O B Amoah has said over GHC217 million has been allocated for the implementation of the Gulf of Guinea Northern Regions Social Cohesion (SOCO) project for this year alone.
Speaking on the Asaase Breakfast Show on Friday (27 October 2023), the minister said, “For 2024, it is more than twice that amount – over GHC477 million but we have not identified the projects yet but that’s the kind of funding we have made available.”
He said the various districts captured under the programme are expected to “bring out the aspect of local economic development – what they can do to bring out to economically develop their localities to get the youth more involved to the ventures.”
“There will be community facilitators and their main role is to organise the youth and educate them on what the social cohesion project is about. We’ve already provided the logistics for this,” the minister added.
The SOCO project is contributing to the prevention of conflict spillover from the Sahelian countries by improving the social and economic resilience of the targeted Northern Regions in the Gulf of Guinea countries (Ghana, Benin, Côte d’Ivoire and Togo).
The SOCO Project is a US$450 million multi-country credit facility project secured by the governments of the four countries from the World Bank and it is aimed at improving facilities and security in the northern sectors and border towns of the four West African countries, in the face of emerging extremism in the West African region.
In Ghana, the SOCO Project is being implemented in six regions in the northern parts of Ghana – namely the Northern, Upper East, Upper West, North East, Savannah and Oti Regions.
Forty-eight MMDAs are benefitting from the project.
Watch the full interview with O B Amoah below:
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