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The Agbogbomefia of the Asogli State, Togbe Afede XIV, has stated that plans to establish an aviation training school at the Ho Airport are still alive.
The school, he explained, would train world-class pilots for all markets.
After the training institution is well grounded, it would be expanded with facilities to undertake maintenance, repairs and overhaul (MRO) of aircraft.
The Agbogbomefia disclosed this to the Daily Graphic in an interview that covered several issues, including his plans for his traditional area.
He, however, could not tell when the project would start because he said although he had paid for the land on which the project was expected to be sited to the Ghana Airport Company Ltd (GACL) in June 2023, he still did not have the land.
“They promised us that within two weeks after we visited the airport together with the managing director and his team, in February 2024, we will have allocation made to us. We had paid about $32,445, one-third of the price, as demanded by GACL in June 2023 for allocation of the land at the Ho Airport.
I am still waiting for the allocation of the land. But we have been ready.
“The business plan has been updated. We have identified the company that will build the hangar, where we will house the aircraft if we want to undertake maintenance.
The aircraft have been identified but we could not acquire them. We can only take the aircraft when we are ready to start and importantly when the hangar is built,” he explained.
Togbe Afede XIV said the building of the MRO hangar might take time but they had identified companies that would do it within months, adding that the company would build the components, ship them to the country and install them.
Touching on the Ho Airport, he said it was built by the previous government but while others were still planning how to commercialise it in the sense of getting passengers in and out daily, he, as the traditional leader, decided to exploit the airport’s other commercial potentials; hence, the plan to establish the aviation training school.
“We hear complaints every day that the Ho Airport is becoming a white elephant. Now that we want to commence something useful, we are facing frustrations, sadly.
Once we establish a training school there, not only would we have paid for the land, okay, but we will also be using the facility and paying fees to the airport company.
“We can convert it to great use as a place to train pilots, not only for Ghana but for the subregion and beyond.
That, for me, would be very phenomenal because it will put Ho firmly on the aviation map because people will come from far and near to learn to fly,” he said.
Togbe Afede, who is the founder of several businesses in the country, said there had been a lot of challenges introducing development to his traditional area because he had no stool land, and what was available was owned in small lots by different people.
He said before the outbreak of COVID-19, for instance, they were looking for several thousands of hectares of land in the northern part of the country for large-scale commercial agriculture.
Similarly, he added, they were looking for land in the North Tongu area to establish a mixed farm and more lately, land to establish a charter city and also build solar facilities.
Asogli Power is in the process of acquiring four sites from his colleague chiefs in northern Ghana.
Togbe Afede added that in 2011, they succeeded in establishing a sister relationship with a province in China through which an agreement for an experimental rice farm was signed.
However, unfortunately, there was a fight over the land so they could not pursue the project.
“So there have been genuine attempts. But what we are trying to do now is to be a little more deliberate about it.
We are preparing a development plan that will see us make interventions across various sectors,” he said.
