Politicians:The New Slave Masters in Ghana

They talk like sheep but they act like wolves. Such is the description of politicians in Ghana. When they want power they would say anything to get elected but when they get the power then they forget about the people.

Today in Ghana people are so poor that they cannot even provide food for their families. But the politicians do not know what is called poverty. Like the slave masters of the slave trade,the politicians, their cronies,the business elite and the well connected determine and control everything in Ghana.

They decide which roads should be constructed or resurfaced and which one should not. They determine which village or town gets connected to the national electricity grid. They determine which region or district receives funding for projects.They determine who should get a contract and whose certificate should be withdrawn.

Together they have hijacked and exercise full control over all the resources including land, labour, capital and revenues from all economic activities such cocoa, gold, diamond and timber exports.

They determine who should eat and who should not. They determine who should get a job and who should get sacked. Have you heard that 420 army recruits have been asked to go home. The slave masters determine who gets a place to sell at Makola market, Asafo market and all the major markets in the country. Have asked the DCE in your area how the stores were distributed?

The slave masters determine who should own which business and who should have a share in that business. You cannot get a certificate to operate a business unless you grease the palm of a politician. You cannot get a contract unless you know a politician in the ruling government.

You are treated differently if you know the regional minister, the governor or the district chief executive (DCE).As far as one knows a cabinet minister he can do whatever he likes and nobody dares question him.

It is always the poor and the have nots who get prosecuted and jailed while the politicians and their cronies who commit atrocious crimes against the state live in their mansions to enjoy their booty. If Mr. Bernard L. Madoff had come from Ghana he would have been a freed man by now as his political friends will make sure he does not go to jail.

Contractors do substandard works, collect hundreds of millions of dollars, give politicians their share and that is all. So a road whose live span is twenty years has to be resurfaced after just two years. For the past twenty years Accra-Kumasi road has been resurfaced more than five times.Projects are inflated and the poor people are made to pay.

Big loans are contracted to build projects like presidential palace enjoyed by the politicians and the poor are made to pay for it.

Like the slavery of old, the politicians, their families, the businessmen and the well connected are not hurt by the storm of poverty in the continent but their slaves who make up the majority of the population do.

These corrupt politicians and their associates are holding the people captive with their ill-conceived economic policies and programmes thereby giving them no chance to develop.

The politicians in Ghana call themselves saviours of the people and have names and titles like Junior Jesus, Servants of the Poor, Friend of the Poor, but they are all lies. None of them cares for the poor but their own stomach. Kuffour wants 6 cars, 2 houses, 2 months holiday, a foundation all to be paid for by the poor in the country. How many Ghanaians own a bedroom not to talk about owning a house? You see how slave masters behave? They have more and want more. The poor have none and they are denied even the little.

Because they care for only their stomach and not the people that is why unemployment is high. That is why people do not people have no access to water. That is why there is power shortages in Accra, Kumasi, Tema, and most of our cities not to mention the rural areas. Because they don't care about the people that is why people have no access to toilet facilities and university students do not have access to accommodation.

If they are not slave masters then who are they?