ACCRA, Dec. 31 (Xinhua) -- For residents of Tamale, the capital of Ghana's Northern Region, the Chinese-built Tamale interchange completed in March this year has undoubtedly become a landmark of the city.
Eric Obeng Gyasi, a Tamale-based bus driver, considered the interchange a game-changer that brought total transformation to the transportation network in the northern city.
"This interchange has brought tremendous change in the traffic movement in the city. When this interchange was not there, we found it difficult to move after loading our buses due to the congestion created by tricycles and heavy cargo trucks moving through the city," Gyasi told Xinhua in a recent interview.
"But the interchange has opened up the city, and it is now easy for us to move our buses to and from Tamale. It has also reduced the number of hours spent in traffic. That means our earnings have gone up," he added.
The opening of the interchange, the first in northern Ghana, was also a landmark in Chinese infrastructure investments in the western African country that has significantly facilitated local residents' lives.
Funding for the Tamale interchange was under the Master Project Support Agreement (MPSA) signed between Ghana and China's Sinohydro Corporation Limited in 2018, which aimed to construct and upgrade selected roads and interchanges around the country in two phases.
Under the agreement, the Chinese company also completed the upgrading of 60 km of feeder roads in the bauxite enclave of Nyinahin, a town in Ghana's Ashanti Region, in March, easing the problems faced by the farming communities in transporting their products to market centers.
Ghanaian Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia expressed joy at the completion ceremony of the Nyinahin roads.
"We are grateful to the Chinese government for the ties between our two countries. There is still more to come under our cooperation," Bawumia said.
Raphael Barfuor Awuah, a resident of Nyinahin, told Xinhua that the project would create easy access for local farmers to cart their farm produce in large volumes to the market centers.
Besides, in southern Ghana's Cape Coast city, the Chinese firm also completed the upgrading of 22 km of inner city roads to ease transportation and enhance commercial and educational activities in September.
Leslie Dwight Mensah, an economist from the Institute of Fiscal Studies, a local economic think tank, believed that the MPSA is immensely beneficial to the country's strategic infrastructure development in 2022.
"China remained a key infrastructure development partner for Ghana. This financing supports Ghana's economic growth and improves the quantity and quality of public services for the citizens, thereby enhancing people's living standards," the economist stated.
Mensah said as a key infrastructure financier and development partner of Ghana, "China is contributing to improving public services in many communities in the country." ■