Director-General of the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT), Kofi Bosompem Osafo-Maafo, revealed that the decision to halt the sale of a 60 percent stake in four SSNIT-owned hotels to Rock City Hotel was driven by objections from Organised Labour.

Speaking on the Citi Breakfast Show with host Bernard Avle, Mr. Osafo-Maafo emphasized that a key aspect of the transaction was extensive consultation with stakeholders. Management responded to various objections by terminating the deal.

“We listened to the objections from the stakeholders and we decided to terminate the process. If you remember, when we had the press conference, we said we would engage all the stakeholders and we have been doing that since then. The unions have also been vociferous and we listened to their demands and decided to terminate the process.”

“My team and I met with the unions and the Labour and Employment Minister and we had two engagements with the NPRA, so there has been continuous engagement and where we are now, we are all seeking the same objective, which is to improve the revenue of the hotels.”

Mr. Osafo-Maafo clarified that the initiative to divest SSNIT's shares in the hotels predates his tenure, dating back to 2010.

“We don’t think that we left it too late, there were businesses that we have had since 2010.

This process started as far back as 2010, when the board invited in investors and then in 2017 and then in 2018 the board directed that we go in to find strategic investors and the process traveled through to 2022.”