Zongo Development Fund supports 134 projects

The Zongo Development Fund has supported 134 infrastructure projects in Zongo communities since 2018, Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia said on Saturday.

The projects include astroturf, classroom blocks, dormitories, Information and Communication (ICT) centres, bridges, roads and drainage systems in the Zongo communities and inner cities to improve the living conditions of residents.

Additionally, 40 brilliant but needy students from those communities were, in 2020, sponsored by the Fund to study medicine in Cuba.

Vice President Bawumia announced this in Accra on Saturday when he commissioned the Islamic Nursing Training School at Kokrobite, Accra, in the Ga West District of the Greater Accra Region.

The school was established by Sheikh Alhassan Hamza Musah to provide community-oriented training in nursing and midwifery for the youth.

Vice President Bawumia expressed the belief that the institution would complement the government’s efforts in training the human resources of the country for effective healthcare delivery.

He expressed the Government’s unwavering commitment towards partnering and supporting private entities in training healthcare workers and investing in health infrastructure.

Dr Bawumia said since the Akufo-Addo-led Government assumed office in 2017, it had recruited more than 90,000 health workers and cleared the backlog of unemployed nursing trainees.

It had, so far, established six medical drone delivery centres to supply medicines, blood products and vaccines to clinics and hospitals in hard-to-reach areas, making Ghana the largest medical drone supply worldwide.

Dr Samuel Akortey Akor, the Board Chair, Islamic Nursing Training School, said the school would absorb the expected large numbers of graduates from the Free senior high schools.

The school’s core objectives, he explained, was to offer professional and ethical teaching and learning in nursing and midwifery for the youth, both Christians and Muslims.

The Zongo Development Fund Act, 2017 (Act 964) was passed by Parliament in 2018 to provide financial resources to develop and transform the socio-economic conditions of Zongo communities across the country.