Minister-designate for Trade and Industry Alan Kyerematen has revealed why the Komenda Sugar Factory is not working.
Appearing before the Appointment Committee, he said this is because a full test run was never completed before the factory was commissioned on May 30, 2016.
According to him, the reason was from an audit report conducted in October 2017.
READ ALSO:Â Mahama gov't put Komenda Sugar Factory on sale after 2 months of reopening - Trade Minister
“A number of critical parts of the factory had not been installed. For instance, there should be a crushing plant for crushing sugarcane. There should also be a vertical and horizontal crystallizer and it is only when these components are in place, one can produce white sugar."
Alan Kyerematen was responding to a question posed by Lawyer Francis Xavier Sosu (NDC- Madina MP).
The nominee said a re-evaluation and a forensic audit have been conducted and the sugar factory has been handed over to Agrotech, but for the COVID-19 pandemic, work would have commenced at the factory to ensure that it was fully operationalised.
The factory, built at a cost of $35 million from an Indian Exim Bank facility, was revamped and inaugurated by the erstwhile Mahama administration in 2016 and closed down in June of the same year and has since remained dormant. It has a capacity to crush 1,250 tonnes of sugarcane per day.
Â