The project, which is to be constructed at the instance of industries sited in the Free Zones industrial enclave in Tema, will serve as a direct link for the transportation of manufactured goods to the Tema Harbour for export.

An Executive Director of ILM Holdings, the company funding the project, Mr Osei Badu, in an exclusive interview with the Daily Graphic, said his company was in the final stages of negotiations with the right authorities to secure the permit for the completion of the project.

 “We are currently in touch with the right authorities and they have not shown any signs of hesitation. We have been working on the permit for the past two years but about three months ago we received a letter from the GRDA concerning the project,” he said. 

He explained that the two approvals needed were for a permit to build the rail line and a licence to operate it.

Mr Badu said the project would be linked to an old railway line built by Dr Kwame Nkrumah that linked the Tema Harbour to the Shai Hills quarry site from where stones for the construction of the port were hauled some 50 years ago.  

He added that an onward 35-km stretch would also be constructed from the enclave in Tema to the Dawa Industrial City currently under construction.

The railway project has other components, such as the manufacture of about 500 slippers per day.

“We are building our own slippers right here in the country and that is quite huge because this means we will be able to produce them at cheaper rates and get more value for our investment,” he said.

The assembling plant for the manufacture of the slippers, according to Mr Badu, had already been set up at Dawa and would be inaugurated on Thursday, September 7.

Government railway projects

Meanwhile, the government has completed satellite and survey works on an 84-km railway line to be constructed from Tema to Akosombo.

The Tema-Akosombo railway project will include the construction of rail tracks of standard gauge, railway maintenance facilities for locomotive and wagons and the building of stations at specific locations with communications and signal equipment, as well as capacity building for personnel in all aspects of the railway system.

 Trains on the new railway project will run at an expected speed of 210km/h on diesel, as against the speed of 56km/h operated by current trains in the country.

Railway sector receives support

Meanwhile, an agreement has been reached between the mining firm, the Ghana Manganese Company (GMC), and the Ghana Railway Company (GRC) Limited for the repair of a section of the dilapidated Western Rail Line.

The $10-million project will see the rehabilitation of up to 15km of rail line from Kojokrom to Tarkwa on the Western Rail Line.

The amount represents freight advance from the GMC to the GRC.

The Minister for Railway Development, Mr Joe Ghartey, said at a press conference last week to announce the agreement that the Kojokrom to Tarkwa line represented an economically viable and critical part of the 340-km Western Rail Line due to its importance to mining companies, one of which is the GMC.

Meanwhile, work has begun on the Western Rail Line, with about $40 million spent so far from the sector ministry’s 2017 budget allocation of GH¢518.4 million.