Akufo-Addo hits back ;  Mahama Doesn’t Know a Good Economy

The temperature ahead of the 2020 election is rising in the two main presidential contenders, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo and John Dramani Mahama, exchanging verbal punches. President Akufo-Addo, last Saturday, gave a heavy one to his opponent, Mr Mahama, saying if a robust economy even slaps the former President, he would not recognise it.

Akufo-Addo’s heavy punch appears to be a reaction to a claim by the National Democratic Congress (NDC) flagbearer that the current Ghanaian economy was in tatters, and that COVID-19 could not be blamed, and the government should bear the responsibility.

But, President Akufo-Addo, in his address at the launch of his party’s 2020 Manifesto, disagreed with his opponent and said Ghanaians would not rely on his assessment of the economy. “I have heard him make the extraordinary claim that Ghana’s economy was in “tatters,” not because of the COVID-19 pandemic, but because of mismanagement. I doubt that he can recognise a well-managed economy even if it slapped him in the face,” he said, adding, “Luckily for us, we do not have to rely on his judgement or assessment of the economy.”

However, in his bid to demystify such thoughts, President Akufo-Addo remarked that Ghana was now in a position to be able to provide reliefs in the midst of the pandemic.

He cited his government’s provision of one hot meal for Junior High School 3 students who are back in school in the midst of a pandemic, payment of six months water bills, and subsidy on electricity bills of all Ghanaians for three months.

Ostensibly, President Akufo-Addo was happy the pandemic did not strike under the tenure of Mr Mahama.

“Indeed, we thank the Almighty that the pandemic did not strike under his presidency, when there was no money in the national kitty to pay teachers and nurses’ allowances,” he stressed.

Also, reacting to another claim by Mr Mahama that the New Patriotic Party (NPP) policies lacked sense, President Akufo-Addo recounted Mr Mahama’s International Monetary Fund (IMF) era to express a contrary position to the claim.

President Akufo-Addo said: “If running an emerging oil economy into the arms of the IMF, because of indiscipline in the management of the public finances, is sense, I am happy that the NPP has another concept of sense. If having sense means cancelling teacher trainee and nurses’ allowances, I am happy that the NPP has another concept of sense.

“If having sense means recording the worst economic management statistics of modern times with the lowest rate of growth of the last thirty years, I am happy the NPP has another concept of sense.

“Having sense in the NPP means being able to take an economy growing at 3.4% to an economy that grew, on the average for three successive years, at 7% per year before the pandemic, and was rightly acknowledged as one of the best performing economies, not just in Africa, but also in the world.

“Having sense in the NPP means executing the Programme for Planting for Food and Jobs, which has led to the revival of Ghanaian agriculture from the doldrums of the NDC years, bringing in its wake bumper harvests and affordable food prices in our markets, and exports of significant quantities of foodstuffs to our neighbours.”

The President continued that having sense in the NPP means implementing policies which, according to the latest Ghana Living Standards Survey, had resulted in a decline in unemployment rates, from 11.9% in 2015 to 7.3% in 2019, adding that he was happy with and preferred the NPP’s sense.

In the concluding part of the President’s address, he reiterated his commitment to peace before, during and after this year’s polls. He called on all political actors to work for peace.

“Let me use this occasion to assure the Ghanaian people that, as President of the Republic, I will do everything within my means to ensure the peace and stability of our country in the run-up to, during, and after the polls of 7th December 2020…and I am calling on all actors in the political space to join me to ensure the maintenance of the peace and stability of our country, and to conduct ourselves in a manner devoid of violence and ethnocentrism. The Ghana Project can best be achieved in unity, tolerance and mutual respect.

“We have an excellent message, as set out in our Manifesto, ‘Leadership of Service: Protecting our progress, transforming Ghana for all’, and as eloquently articulated by that brilliant Ghanaian, Mahamudu Bawumia, my most esteemed running mate and Vice President, which will protect our progress and continue down the path of social and economic transformation, on which all Ghanaians are now embarked. It is four more years for Nana and the NPP to do more for you.”

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