My bid for President is no melodrama-Akpaloo

VOLTA , May 17, GNA - Mr Kofi Akpaloo, Founder and Flag bearer of the Independent Peoples Party (IPP) on Wednesday said his bid to be President of Ghana was not a mere sensational move but fired by a strong desire to solve the country's problems.

He said the IPP had cogent plans for all spheres of nation building to take the growth of the country, now sluggish, into a sprint.

Mr Akpaloo, 42, a Chartered Accountant, was addressing about 60 supporters in Ho as part of his tour of the Volta Region.

He said he would use a mix of free market and social support policies to improve the wherewithal of Ghanaians across all economic groupings.

Mr Akpaloo said he would prefer mobilising cash from within Ghana to invest in capital projects than borrowing from abroad.

He said his government would make access to credit fluid to enable small businesses to flourish, raising the income of the ordinary Ghanaians, to create a viral market place of production and sales.

Mr Akpaloo said he would make the Senior High School (SHS) the first tier exit point in education in Ghana by joining the Junior High School (JHS) to the SHS as composite colleges linked to primary schools.

He observed that creating computer pools in the small communities would have been more beneficial to school kids than giving them, (school pupils) laptops individually.

Mr Akpaloo said the pivot of his agricultural policy would be guaranteed prices at the farm gates for major produce and processing of raw foods into value added handy foods.

He said his government would give allowances of various amounts to children, the unemployed and the aged not on paid pension.

Mr Akpaloo said he was sure to win the elections and that he had a premonition that Nana Konadu Agyeman-Rawlings, Former First Lady and Mr Asiedu Nketia, General-Secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) would collapse the NDC and that the New Patriotic Party (NPP) was also no match for the IPP.

Mr Akpaloo, who said he hailed partly from Anyako in the Keta Municipality of the Volta Region and the Central Region, but domiciled in Kumasi, said he had been wonderfully received in all the regions he visited and was sure to make a mark in Ghanaian politics.

He said when elected as President, he would facilitate the founding of a university in the southern part of the Volta Region as well as build a stadium and an airport in the region.

Mr Kofi Agyei, IPP Communication Director, said Mr Akpaloo was a visionary while Mr Enoch Kyei, IPP Executive officer, called for an end to the dominance of the NDC and the NPP in Ghanaian politics.

GNA