Business News of Tuesday, 13 April 2004

Source: GNA

Speaker adjourns House to approve Chinese transport facility

Accra, April 13, GNA - Speaker of Parliament, Mr. Peter Ala Adjetey on Tuesday adjourned business of the House to Wednesday to enable it approve a Buyer's Credit Facility of 12,886,456 US dollars from the Bank of China for the supply of 250 buses.

The adjournment follows a disagreement and lack of consensus by both sides of the House on an on-lending agreement, which would enable the government extend the credit facility to the Metro Mass Transit Limited (MMT).

The on-lending agreement would spell out the business plan of MMT and how it would repay the loan.

The Parliamentary Committee on Finance had recommended that there should be an on-lending agreement between the MMT and government to ensure that the loan was monitored and repayment guaranteed. The Minority therefore, said in the absence of the on-lending agreement it was not prudent to approve the Buyer's Credit facility, which was the substantive agreement.

They said it should be deferred to allow members enough time to investigate and analyse the detail conditions of the on-lending agreement.

The Majority called on the House to approve the facility whilst the information the on-lending agreement was provided at a latter date.