Giving you a little confidence to trust in President Nana Akufo-Addo

This article is directed at giving some doubting and vacillating minds a little confidence about President Nana Akufo-Addo. Unless one is obstinately resolutely determined to hold on to their anti-Akufo-Addo views, formed as a culmination of their stringent political party inclination and their deliberate quest to paint him darker than he actually appears, for all obvious dirty politicking reasons, one will have changed after reading this article.

To start with, may I pose the following question to many a Ghanaian, whether a discerning or not, whether an academic or illiterate, whether honest or dishonest, and finally, whether wise or stupid? Is President Nana Akufo-Addo a more visionary leader that aspires to lift Ghana out of the economic afflictions it is beset with since the nation’s independence, than most of his predecessors?

Who is a visionary leader and what makes one be seen and classified as a visionary leader? Is it not he who is aware of the problems his nation and people are faced with, and how badly such problems will become if measures were not taken to mitigate them? Is he not a farsighted leader he who takes and implements decisions, policies and programmes of long term beneficial effects to better the conditions of living of the governed and to uplift the image of his people and nation? Is he not the one who has good intentions and takes practical steps to realise them since good intentions alone cannot bring about the world peace?

President Nana Akufo-Addo knew how Ghana suffers from periodic famine, or year on year insufficiency of food production, hence the country relying heavily on foreign importation of food to supplement the little produced in the country. For how long can Ghana, a country blessed with arable fertile lands and in the midst of plenty virgin forests, go hungry to only be rescued by importation of food for the survivability of her citizens?

When President Nana Akufo-Addo came to the conclusion that a soldier walks on his stomach and a hungry man is an angry man, he introduced the policy of “Planting for food and job”. He foresaw the dangers inherent in the nation’s overly reliance on importation of food.

It is not only that Ghana does not have the needed amount of foreign exchange to import food but the nation could be held hostage in future by the countries we import food from. Should they for a reason or the other, refuse to sell food to us, many are Ghanaians that will go hungry, fall ill or die.

As I write, most European countries are going through energy crisis with cost of consumption of energy to households skyrocketing. This is all because of Russian President Vladimir Putin using Russian gas supply to Europe as an effective weapon to get the leaders of the Western European countries to succumb to his will of abandoning Ukraine for him to invade and annex it.

He sees using the vital and most needed commodity, thus gas, that the Europeans cannot do away with, especially in this bleak wintry months, to get them to do his wish. If President Nana Akufo-Addo is trying to avoid similar fate happening to Ghana in respect of the nation’s food needs, does he not inspire confidence in you for him?

Do Ghanaians know the role water, forest and arable land plays in the survivability and sustainability of human beings and human life, respectively, on earth? Water is life, do Ghanaians know that?

Prior to Nana Akufo-Addo ascending the presidency, native Ghanaians and some legal and illegal foreigners had taken to uncontrollable destruction of the nation’s water bodies, forests and arable lands. All the major rivers in the country - Bia River, Tano River, Nini River, · Ankobra River, Pra River, Ofin River, Birim River, Anum River, Ayensu River and Densu River had nearly turned, or were turning, into, flowing rivers of mud. This is an indisputable fact that only a malicious fool will attempt to deny!

President Nana Akufo-Addo, knowing the importance of water without which one cannot survive, vowed to fight whatever was causing the devastation of the nation’s rivers or water bodies. He found out that it was being caused by the uncontrolled taking to surface and alluvial mining by both Ghanaian locals and foreigners of whom the Chinese were in the majority.

Subsequently, he created a department or a taskforce to fight the cancerous illegal surface mining, otherwise called in the Ghanaian parlance as “galamsey”. He declared that if fighting the “galamsey” to ensure the nation’s water bodies reverse to their natural non-contaminated state will cost him his presidency, so be it. Is it not only a visionary and “I care for you and my nation” leader that will put his job on the line to save his people and nation from thirst of want of water to drink?

Do we not know how rivers and forests contribute to rainfall that our crops need to flourish? I shall not be revisiting my biology and geography lessons but will ask readers to check how transpiration, evaporation and condensation help with rainfall and how, when, where and why those processes do take place.

Does galamsey not spoil the lands in addition to damaging the rivers? Without land, arable and fertile land of course, our little food production in the country will suffer. The president took bold steps to address these concerns.

While President Nana Akufo-Addo was taking all these farsighted decisions and implementing relevant policies, the NDC members that are shockingly myopic, visionless, malicious and corrupt, were visiting the surface miners in their stations and villages assuring them to vote NDC in election 2020 in order to be able to resource them to carry out large scale surface mining when NDC comes to power.

I wonder how some people are proudly able to compare former President John Dramani Mahama and NDC to President Nana Akufo-Addo and NPP only to choose the former as much better? On what factors do they base their analysis, if not only on sheer and unreasonable political affiliation, hatred and mischief?

Education is the backbone of most successful nations in the world as cocoa is the backbone of Ghana’s economy. Does it not take a visionary leader to see the benefit to his citizens acquiring formal education hence introducing an educational policy that will encourage most people to acquire education?

When then Presidential-candidate Nana Akufo-Addo was telling Ghanaians he will introduce free Senior High School education if given the nod to become president of Ghana, then President-cum-presidential-candidate John Dramani Mahama and his NDC party and government, were campaigning against it. They were saying it is not feasible hence a political gimmick by Nana Addo to win the election. Even now that the policy has been implemented, although beset with some problems which need ironing out, the NDC are still criticising it.

President Nana Akufo-Addo, as sincere to seeing official corruption eradicated from Ghana, fulfilled his campaign promise of introducing the Office of Special Prosecutor. However, the insincerity, maliciousness, diabolism and pursuit of hidden selfish interests and agenda by Special Prosecutor Martin Amidu, have until now suppressed the relevance of the creation of that office. The president did his part but Martin Amidu and his colluding Ghanaians have tried to scupper it.

I have written and published a few articles on “Risk Assessment” in regard to the resignation of Martin Amidu from his Special Prosecutor’s post. Using his conducted risk assessment into the Agyapa Transaction deal to conclude that President Nana Akufo-Addo is corrupt is a blow far below the belt. I think Martin Amidu does not understand what a risk assessment is hence citing that as the last straw that broke the camel’s back, thus, the corrupt practice by Nana Akufo-Addo to move him to resign. This reason by him is not only malevolence but unprofessional, preposterous and completely deceptive.

A risk assessment is done prior to the commencement of a project. It tells the nature of the project, how and when it will be executed, the stages of the execution involved, the problems entailed and measures taken to avoid or mitigate the risks to ensure that all goes well.

Was the Agyapa Transaction deal not yet to be tabled before parliament and when accepted, it becomes operational? If the risk assessment had detected possible corruption if implemented, was it not a requirement for solutions to be prescribed to avoid that occurring?

It is only ignorant partisan people that can be fooled by Martin Amidu using the Agyapa deal to tag President Nana Akufo-Addo as corrupt. Surely, for lack of knowledge, my people perish. I can never be fooled by Martin Amidu telling me that President Nana Akufo-Addo is corrupt and has caused financial loss to Ghana on a policy that was yet to be implemented without a dime gone into the investment.

Yes, Daniel Domelovo was asked to proceed on compulsory leave to exhaust his two to three years accumulated paid annual holiday leave. As a public officer and by the Public Service Act, his annual leave that he could not forgo by law, was long overdue.

Ghana Labour Act 2003 (Act 651), Holidays Act, 2001 (Act 601), states as following; “Any agreement to relinquish the right to annual leave or to forgo such leave is null and void”.

Again, he kept lying about his age on official documents. That alone is a fraud.

How and why did he decide to accumulate his accrued annual paid holiday leave without ever desiring to proceed on leave, although it was obligatory?

I contacted my senior brother in Canada who was an accountant in Ghana over three decades ago, on why Domelovo, the Auditor General, was creating a public scene about his leave? He told me that many a corrupt head of department does not want to go on leave so that his replacement officer, while on leave, may not delve into his documents to detect their wrongdoings. Being an accountant who at times was sent out by his company to audit certain accountants, he knew what he was saying, concluding from the results of his unpalatable discoveries.

I am not accusing Domelovo of any such illegal acts but his intransigence about not going on leave raised an eyebrow.

It is erroneous on the part of many a Ghanaian who does not read, research and enquire, to conclude that the president forced him out because he would detect and inform the public on the corrupt practices of the NPP government. Whether that was true or not, was his outstanding paid holiday leave not long overdue? Again, was he not gone past his retirement age after all the criminal steps of change of dates and places of birth as he took, when he personally filled in official documents?

If people older than him are still working in the public service, that is another issue to take up with the president to ask for explanation. Are those people also accumulating their earned annual paid holiday leave without being ordered to take them?

Finally, was it not only right for President Nana Akufo-Addo to cancel the contract of awarding 75% of the Nyinahin bauxite deposit to Ibrahim Mahama, the younger half-sibling of former President John Dramani Mahama? Why did then outgoing President John Mahama feel it necessary to sign that contract to his brother without seeking parliamentary approval as is required by the 1992 Constitution by which Ghana is governed?

Look at the many last minute.com top appointments the outgoing President John Mahama made to tie the incoming President Nana Akufo-Addo’s hands behind his back?

If the above few cited instances, including the resolved devastating 4-year constantly power outages (Dumsor) throughout Ghana as envisaged under former President John Mahama, cannot inspire a little confidence in you for President Nana Akufo-Addo, then I don’t know what thing else can do.

Let us remove our opaque lenses to see clearly to appreciate the good things President Nana Akufo-Addo does and at the same time constructively criticise him for the bad things he does.

This publication is coming to you from the proud and fearless son of Kumawu/Asiampa, who is feared by corrupt traditional overlords and public officials when he comes into contact with them, upon disclosing his identity.

I dedicate this article to my fellow columnist Joel Savage. I wish him a belated Merry Christmas but a Happy New Year in advance. Joel, I hope to have inspired a little confidence in you about President Nana Akufo-Addo. Let us help him with constructive criticisms in the best interest of Ghana and Ghanaians, rather than seeking to paint him darker only to destroy him and the future of Ghana. He means good for mother Ghana, despite any unfolding problems and negative public perceptions about him.

Rockson Adofo

Monday, 27 December 2021