A Week’s Salary to Build a National Cathedral? The True Cost of Mahama’s Funding Shift

By Prof. Jeffrey Haynes

President John Dramani Mahama has announced that public funds will no longer be used to finance Ghana’s controversial National Cathedral, insisting that the Christian community and private partners should bear the remaining costs. Speaking at a regional town hall meeting, the president clarified that while he supports the idea as a Christian, the multi-million-dollar project was never official national policy. Instead, he characterised it as a deeply personal pledge made to God by his predecessor, former President Nana Akufo-Addo – one that should not be funded by the taxpayer.

President Mahama’s declaration came in the wake of several developments in the long-running National Cathedral saga, originally announced in March 2017 by the then president, Nana Akufo-Addo. As readers will be aware, the issue dogged the Akufo-Addo presidency, with prolonged, heated debate about the expenditure of approximately $90 million dollars of tax payers’ money without tangible signs of progress.

Viability and future of the National Cathedral

Prior to President Mahama’s recent statement on the viability and future of the National Cathedral, his government took four major administrative and financial steps in relation to the stalled project. First, in July 2025, the government officially dissolved the National Cathedral Secretariat, with spokespeople confirming that the state will no longer allocate tax payers’ money to it. Second, the administration instituted a ‘forensic audit’ of the project to examine the estimated $90 million already expended. The resulting report is now finalised and recently handed over to the Attorney-General. No details have yet publicly emerged on its findings and conclusions. President Mahama did however indicate that a principal stakeholder in the National Cathedral project – the Christian Council of Ghana – will be informed about the findings of the audit in order to ensure full transparency.

Funding issues

The third step is President Mahama’s call for voluntary Christian funding of the construction and running costs of the cathedral. Pointing to alternative models, the president suggested that the Christian community and development partners should have the capacity voluntarily to raise the necessary funds. He noted that if Ghana’s Christian adults each contributed GH₵1,000, the cathedral could easily be realised without recourse to tax payers’ money. There is no official, standalone exact public count for the number of Christians aged 18 or older in Ghana, but estimates based on the 2021 national census data put the figure at approximately 15 to 17 million people. If each contributed GHS1,000, this would raise between GHS15,000,000,000 and GHS17,000,000,000, or $1.3 -1.5 billion. Given that the estimated costs of construction, furnishing, equipping and maintaining the current version of the National Cathedral would be in the region of $400,000,000, then $1.3 -1.5 billion would comfortably meet the anticipated costs – with money to spare. It is worth noting, however, that the average weekly net salary in Ghana’s formal sector is approximately GH₵910 (around $60), based on an average gross monthly formal salary of GH₵5,000 minus mandatory social security and income tax. Thus, adult Christians would be requested to devote a week’s salary to the National Cathedral project. It is not clear how much the unemployed or under-employed Christians would need to find.

Fourth, the President criticised the $400 million projected cost as unreasonable in Ghana’s current economic climate: improving, but not yet resilient, prospering but not yet booming. He highlighted Nigeria’s National Ecumenical Centre in Abuja – built for roughly $30 million – as a more realistic benchmark. He also indicated that future consultations with the Christian community might include changing the controversial location of the project, which previously forced the demolition of state infrastructure and judges’ bungalows.

The way forward?

President Mahama’s announcement shifts the responsibility of reviving or modifying the project directly onto a newly formed technical committee established by the Christian Council of Ghana, which has given itself a one-month window to propose private funding frameworks and explore its long-term future.

The president’s decisive policy shift effectively closes the chapter on state-funded religious monuments in Ghana, drawing a firm line between personal presidential pledges and national policy. By dissolving the National Cathedral Secretariat and concluding a ‘forensic audit’, the administration has successfully insulated public revenues from the fiscal burden of the controversial $400 million project. However, shifting the financial responsibility entirely to the Christian community introduces profound socio-economic questions. While individual Christians’ contributions of GHCS1,000 each could realistically cover the remainder of the construction costs, the reality of Ghana’s formal economy paints a different picture. For the average worker earning GHS910 a week, such a donation demands a sacrifice of an entire week’s net income—an unrealistic expectation amidst broader economic recovery pressures.

Ultimately, benchmarking the project against more pragmatic, cost-effective regional models like Nigeria’s National Ecumenical Centre is a necessary step toward fiscal realism. The true path forward now rests in the hands of the Christian Council of Ghana and. more generally, the country’s Christian majority. The church must design a transparent, privately driven framework that balances spiritual aspirations with the stark financial realities facing everyday citizens, ensuring that national unity is not compromised by a building meant to inspire it.