Vice President, Dr.  Mahamudu Bawumia has broken grounds for the commencement of infrastructural works on a 150 million US Dollars investment Project for 48 districts in six regions under the Gulf of Guinea Northern Regions Social Cohesion (SOCO) Project.

The project comes as a proactive response to the surging spillover of fragility, conflict, and violence from the Sahel to the northern border regions with the objective to improve regional collaboration and the socioeconomic and climate change resilience of border zone communities in the target northern regions of the Gulf of Guinea countries exposed to conflict and climate risks.

The project interventions will contribute to the prevention of the spread of conflict from the Sahel region, reduce vulnerability to climate change, strengthen local institutions, improve economic opportunities, build public trust, and strengthen regional dialogue across the Gulf of Guinea countries (Benin, Ivory Coast, Ghana, and Togo)

In brief remarks at the ceremony held at Yendi on Wednesday, 25^th October 2023, Dr. Bawumia reiterated governments commitment to safeguarding an improved welfare of all persons in the country and more importantly people living within communities that are likely to be exposed to fragilities that threatens their sustainable socioeconomic growth and development.

“The SOCO project is a timely investment from the Government of Ghana (GoG), and it is expected to deliver socio-economic community-level climate-resilient infrastructure, skills development and training of the youth and women including the vulnerable” he stressed.

 These projects, Dr. Bawumia noted, included provision of water, construction of school buildings, health facilities, construction of markets, earth dams and other critical physical infrastructure and has currently created jobs for 434 Community Facilitators (CFs) and other Specialists.

He added that the project would also improve access to basic social and economic services, promote local economic development, gender equality, and improve environmental management when the projects are executed efficiently and effectively.

“I am extremely excited to be part of this historic and symbolic sod cutting of 15 physical projects within the Yendi Municipality to pave way for the construction of all the 582 projects under the Gulf of Guinea Northern Regions Social Cohesion (SOCO) Project to enhance the resilience of our cities, communities and the country at large for sustainable development” he stated.

Dr. Bawumia emphasized that funding for the project is available and has been disbursed for the execution of all the subprojects and therefore contractors will not be inhibited with resources for project execution; citing Yendi Municipal Assembly to have received its allocation to commence work. He therefore cautioned all implementing agencies, both at the national and sub-national levels, that implementation delays will not be tolerated.

The Hon. Minister for Local Government, Decentralisation and Rural Development (MLGDRD) Mr. Daniel Botwe remarked that the SOCO project employs is a community driven approach that safeguards its sustainability and impact and provides a game changing avenue for communities to be resilient .

Thanking Government for the project and what it will deliver to the Yendi Municipality and the northern region at large, His Majesty Ndan Ya Naa Abukari Mahama II, the Overlord of Dagbon traditional area expressed delight and commended government highly for providing proactive leadership and designing a life transforming project in the country’s development efforts.

Fifty-two motorbikes, 33 laptops and five pickups have been handed over to five Municipal Assemblies in the Upper West Region to enhance the implementation and monitoring on the Gulf of Guinea Northern Region and Social Cohesion Project. (SOCO).

The Project has as its fundamental objective of improving collaboration among communities

The Gulf of Guinea Northern Regions Social Cohesion (SOCO) Project is a sub-Sahel Regional project aimed at providing support for the northern parts of the Gulf of Guinea countries (Ghana, Cote d’Ivoire, Togo and Benin), that are hardest hit by fragilities due to food insecurity and climate change, conflict and violence. These risk factors are anticipated to influence community members and youth within these sub-Sahel regions to be highly susceptible to extremist ideologies.

SOCO is expected to help improve the socio-economic resilience of 48 targeted districts in the Upper West, Upper East, Northern, North East, Savannah and Oti Regions through various components in the form of investments in Infrastructure, Local Economic Development and Youth Engagement activities.

It is expected to also provide an avenue to coordinate border-area investments, information and improve regional dialogues. The project uses the Community Driven Development (CDD) approach where decisions for investments are taken by communities in a participatory manner, to promote a sense of ownership for the investments that will be made.

Officials from the World Bank led by Mr. Nicolas Perrin, Global Sustainability and Inclusion Practice Manager called on the Minister for Local Government, Hon. Daniel Botwe in his office in Accra.

The meeting was to discuss with the Minister and the Gulf of Guinea Northern Region Social Cohesion Project (SOCO) Ghana Project Implementation Unit (PIU) on the progress of the project implementation, status updates and the next steps.

The World Bank Team expressed delight and commended Ghana highly for putting up an impressive performance on the Implementation of the Project so far.