A Country that Need Total Reconstruction Require the Experience Hands of John Mahama

The economy of Ghana for the past seven years have seen the kind of governance we cannot be proud of. A proper assessment of President Nana Addo’s government will indicate that his predecessor and others before have performed much better in managing the economy. The rating agencies have declared Ghana junk, the corruption perception index have remained worse, infrastructure have retrogressed, and all economic indicators including inflation, exchange rate depreciation, interest rates, and so on have turned worse.

A government to empower and improve the living conditions of Ghanaians was assured us in 2017 and we believe. We believe the assurers were credible enough to live up to their word of ensuring that a prosperous nation is created for all to enjoy. We instead experience the reverse as the average Ghanaian have become even poorer, cried and ran short of tears.

The biggest problem we now face is corruption in public life. President Nana Addo have made it possible for people in power to forget of the Ghanaian morals and principles of good governance to focus on ways that will make them rich at the detriment of Ghanaians however unhappy they have become.

A government that complained of sole source in public procurement have made it a daily life affair. Contracts that have not met the conditions for sole source are now given to newly established companies whose ownership are largely traced to people in power. We have seen several road contracts given to the Vice President’s brother using sole source. The result is poor execution.

It is not only public procurements that are given to functionaries in government. There are many other examples that give unequal opportunities to all Ghanaians. People so connected to the government benefit more in these opportunities than those not connected. For instance, most government scholarships, funding for start-ups, recruitments and so on go to NPP members.

The government have also found a way to silence all critical minds in this country. Civil society, journalists, priests and others who were critical of the Mahama government have been silenced in one way or the other. Members of the minority are not spared. For instance, the current Minority Leader is being prosecuted in court over the ambulance deal only because he is so critical of the government. They are doing all this so they can have their way to achieve their agenda of state capture.

Their poor governance and harassment of critical minds have resulted in the total collapse of the Ghanaian economy. The quality of life has deteriorated and the image of Ghana in the international community have been so damaged. All forms of assessment of the Ghanaian economy indicate that we are not doing well like before. We have reached a certain stage where an experienced hand is required take us out of the doldrums.

The macro economic performance of this government have been worse than what we experienced under Mills/Mahama. They have resorted to statistical gymnastics and pandemic propaganda to make Ghanaians believe that they are doing better but that is not getting into the ears. For the first time in our history, we are not able to honour our debt obligations to our creditors. The liquidity position of government has become so worse that the government now competes with the private sector for loans with high treasury bills rates.

Some micro economic indicators in 2016 indicate that the economy was on a strong path to recovery when we subscribed to the IMF programme in 2014. GDP growth increased from 2.1 percent the previous year to 3.6 percent in 2016. Inflation averaged 17.45 percent, a 0.3 percentage points above the 2015 figure, Cedi depreciation to the Dollar lowered to 9.7 percent from 15.7 percent in 2015, and fiscal deficit was within 5 percent of GDP. The economy was further projected to grow to 6.6 percent in 2017, and 8 to 9 percent in 2018 by the government.

This promising economy has been run down by the current administration. From 2019, the economy started showing signs of depression. By the end of 2023, the mismanagement of the economy has produced a GDP growth of 2.9 percent, average inflation rate of 40.28 percent, Cedi to Dollar depreciation rate of 27.8 percent and fiscal deficit was more than 7 percent of GDP. These indicators and many more does not speak well of a government when in opposition rejected all the indicators enumerated above under Mills/Mahama.

We all know that infrastructure has a direct correlation with employment and GDP growth. Despite the government declaring year of roads, our score on the latest Road Quality Indicator is 3 points out of 7 in 2019, John Mahama’s score in 2016 was 3.5 points and Ghana’s highest score was 4.06 points in 2013. The Institute of Fiscal Studies in 2021 stated that capital spending as a percentage of government revenue have reached a record low of 23.3 percent from 2017 – 2020. This reduction has undermined the country’s ability to rapidly close its infrastructure deficits.

Several complaints of bad roads, schools and hospital infrastructure gaps, poor electricity expansion and deterioration of existing infrastructure are received across the length and breadth of this country. The NPP strong hold of Ashanti Region have complained of neglect by the government in providing them with infrastructure.

Low infrastructure leads to higher unemployment rate and low GDP. No wonder the Ghana statistical service reported that youth unemployment rate jumped from 7.4 percent in 2013 to 12.6 percent in 2017. It has worsened further to 14.7 percent in 2023 and the gap keep widening. The GDP statistics indicates a steady decline from 2018.

The hardship is real and many Ghanaians are going through it. Those who are to account for their stewardship have found convenient ways to escape the failures and credit themselves with the few successes through pandemic propaganda. We have reached a point where the experienced hands of John Mahama is required to totally reconstruct an economy that have been crushed by Nana Addo and Dr. Bawumia.