Vice-President's residence in Cantonments still unfinished 13 years after work began

Pinned summary · as of 04:43

A residence planned for Ghana's Vice-President in Cantonments, Accra, remains incomplete and unoccupied, more than a decade after builders started work in 2013. The Fourth Estate, an investigative group, published its findings on the project on Tuesday, 29 September 2026, and MyJoyOnline and YEN.com.gh both reported on them. Three half-built concrete structures now sit inside a high wall on the plot.

What we know

• The site in Cantonments has three unfinished structures behind a high wall. They were meant to serve as the official home of the country's Vice-President.
• Building started in 2013, and the project has stood unfinished for about 13 years, according to the Fourth Estate's findings as relayed by both publications.
• The Fourth Estate's investigation traced spending on the incomplete structures to a little over US$2.4 million. MyJoyOnline cited documents showing that US$2,425,752.21 had been paid to the contractor by 11 April 2014.

What's disputed / unconfirmed

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  Several figures have been given for the total cost. The consultant's records, obtained by the Fourth Estate, show an original contract sum of US$3,563,884.50 that does not appear to have been formally revised. The contractor, CONSAR Limited, was hired in October 2013 under the Mahama government, according to MyJoyOnline. Earlier project papers, cited by YEN.com.gh, gave about US$13.9 million. Nana Akomea, who was then the New Patriotic Party's communications director, produced a document he attributed to the consultant, Architectural and Engineering Services Limited (AESL), with a total near US$13.97 million. In 2017, Builsa South MP Clement Apaak told Starr FM that only US$5.9 million had been budgeted. MyJoyOnline noted that the government has not publicly reconciled the three figures.
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  Reports from the construction period suggested about US$8 million had been paid out before work stopped. MyJoyOnline recorded a similar claim: Mr Akomea's document listed US$8,179,138.95 as spent and US$5,789,113.71 as still owed. Both sit far above the US$2.4 million the Fourth Estate could document, and YEN.com.gh said the gap raises questions about where the difference lies.
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  AESL told the Fourth Estate that building slowed to a halt once a new government took over after the 2016 elections, long after the May 2015 target had lapsed. YEN.com.gh reported that in 2017 the contractor blamed a funding shortfall lasting nearly two years and asked the government to clear what it owed so work could resume.
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  An official close to the project, speaking to the Fourth Estate without being named, said a number of tall apartment blocks have risen near the compound since work began, and that some look down on it. The official suggested this could create security problems and might rule the property out as the Vice-President's home. No other account backs this claim.
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  Mahamudu Bawumia, then Vice-President, cast doubt in 2017 on reports of a US$13.9 million price tag. Mr Apaak said Kwesi Amissah-Arthur, the former Vice-President, had briefed Dr Bawumia and told him nothing more had been paid. Only MyJoyOnline carries these statements.
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  YEN.com.gh reported that dense vegetation now covers the site, that the structures are visibly deteriorating, and that no government has moved either to finish or to formally abandon the project. It also described the project as having drawn criticism over how it was procured, its rising costs and its long suspension. These points come from that publication alone.

Why it matters for Ghana

The residence was to be paid for from public money, so the gap between the documented US$2.4 million and the much larger sums cited elsewhere is a question of how state funds were handled. Taxpayers in Accra and across Ghana have no clear public account of what was spent or what the unfinished buildings are now worth. The Vice-President still has no purpose-built official home, and the compound continues to occupy a plot in a central Accra neighbourhood.