Mahama Must Listen To Political Parties'

A Parliamentarian has added his voice to the debate on the appointment of chairman of the Electoral Commission (EC) to succeed Dr Kwadwo Afari-Gyan - who goes on retirement soon.

Patrick Yaw Boamah, Member of Parliament (MP) for Okaikoi Central Constituency in Accra, although admits that the president has the right to appoint the chairman in consultation with the Council of State, has stressed that he (president) must have the concerns of the political parties, and more especially Ghanaians, to guide him in the appointment.

In an exclusive interview with DAILY GUIDE last week, Mr Boamah emphasized that any person chosen as the EC chairman must be open-minded, fair and work to the satisfaction of all Ghanaians.

'He must be someone who Ghanaians can repose their confidence in so that the results he declares after elections will be acceptable to both the winners and the losers,' Mr Yaw Boamah underscored.

The MP, who said he had gone through the initial processes for the parliamentary primaries on the ticket of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) in a bid to retain his seat, noted that the poor running of the economy by the Mahama-led National Democratic Congress (NDC) administration had affected all sectors of the economy.

'The economy is not in good shape. We want a stable currency so that we can plan and predict. You can't go to the market today and buy a tin of milk at GH¢1.00 and go tomorrow and buy it at GH¢1.50. I don't think that is what Ghanaians voted the NDC for,' he observed.

Mr Yaw Boamah asserted that the International Monetary Fund's (IMF's) $918 million bail-out over a three-year period was not enough to turn the economy around and predicted that 'unemployment is going to increase' because already, there is a net freeze on employment. 'The IMF will not give the government space to do what it wants to do,' he added.

Commenting on the crime wave in the country, the MP noted that unemployment and lack of trust in the system are the major contributing factors. 'Some people don't believe there is transparency in the system and must therefore go through the backdoor to get certain things. People must be made to have confidence in the system. They must feel that they can be offered employment based on merit,' Mr Boamah advocated and urged the government to invest in the right sectors of the economy to create jobs for the youth.

According to the MP - who is a member of both the Judiciary and the Foreign Affairs Committees of Parliament - President Mahama does not need to be given open proposals for the solution of the myriad challenges facing the country. He said the president could look at how the various political parties intend to solve problems in every sector of the economy in their manifestoes and adopt them, stressing that it behooves the National Development Planning Commission (NDPC) to put such policies together.

He, however, added that the NDPC is poorly resourced, and criticised its composition.

By Peter Atiemo