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Stop Insulting Ghanaians---NPP Tells Mahama

By Daily Guide
NPP Stop Insulting Ghanaians---NPP Tells Mahama
MAY 4, 2015 LISTEN

President John Mahama's recent comments on the increasing worker layoffs and collapsing businesses caused by the protracted power crisis (dumsor) in the country have attracted heavy criticisms.

President Mahama, in his May Day speech on Friday, took a swipe at companies which have been retrenching workers because of the power crisis. He said smart businesses were not laying off workers, but “are rather investing more resources to expand their production in Ghana.”

This has generated a huge public uproar with many Ghanaians, including the New Patriotic Party (NPP), expressing disappointment in the president's comments, saying he is insensitive to the real challenges facing industries and the people who have been enduring dumsor for over three years.

The Ghana Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCCI) described Mahama's comments on the power crisis as unfortunate.

Several companies, including multinationals, have had to lay off workers running into several thousands, with more heads on the chopping board if the situation does not improve immediately.

The GCCI President, Seth Adjei Baah, said it takes the combined efforts of many entrepreneurs to create jobs for Ghanaians and so their concerns must not be taken lightly.

'And if we are talking about foreigners coming in to invest, we should look at the figures realistically. How much has come through [foreign] direct investment over the last one year? How many new companies have been established and how many people have been employed during the period?' he quizzed.

The NPP says the comments were unbefitting of the office Mr Mahama occupies.

The party believes that 'It is cruel, insensitive treatment of Ghanaian companies for their own president to run them down and deride them by intimating that these companies and businesses are not 'smart' and do not believe in the government's ability to end dumsor.'

In a statement signed by its Director of Communications, Nana Akomea, the NPP said, 'The president was simply saying that Ghanaian businesses which were downsizing and laying off workers in these trying times of dumsor were simply not being smart, and had no faith in the government.'

Concern
According to the NPP, 'These sentiments of the president betray a deep lack of sensitivity and sympathy for Ghanaian businesses and companies in these trying times. It also betrays a deep misunderstanding and lack of appreciation on the president's part for the terrible difficulties Ghanaian businesses face from the twin evils of dumsor, and rapid cedi depreciation and unstable macro-economy. The least these companies expect is for the president to live up to his own several assurances on ending dumsor and stabilising the cedi.'

Considering the fact that the energy crisis has been in effect a full three years (since June 2012) and the cedi having seen the worst depreciation (since 2001), Nana Akomea said, 'It is a near miracle that businesses in Ghana have survived at all.'

Effect
Within the period, he indicated that 'The plight of Ghanaians engaged in small scale artisanal businesses such as welders, hairdressers, tailors, seamstresses, vulcanisers, auto sprayers, barbers, corn mill operators, cold store operators, is terrible' and that 'even bigger companies and businesses, many of them multinationals, have come under enormous stress.'

The NPP has therefore urged President Mahama 'to be alive to his responsibilities and repeated assurances to end dumsor, stabilise the cedi, reduce interest rates and stabilise the macro-economic environment.'

Aside that, the party has charged Mahama to 'refrain from pointing fingers at hard pressed Ghanaian businesses and companies at this very trying period,' whilst urging him to 'ask himself if he has been smart in resolving dumsor, resolving the cedi's rapid depreciation over the last three years, resolving high interest rate and resolving the unstable macro-economic environment.'

By Charles Takyi-Boadu

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