I will beat John - Bawumia

Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) running mate, has stated that he will beat Mr. John Mahama, running mate of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), if they both engage in a debate.

He pointed out that the NDC running mate would be no match for him when they come face-to-face to display their intellectual prowess and talk about policies to transform Ghana.

The NPP running mate thus indicated his readiness to engage Mr. Mahama on any platform in a debate on national issues.

“I will face him anywhere, and I bet you, I will floor him without sweat,” he stressed.

Dr. Bawumia was reacting to a question posed to him by a journalist at a press conference in Kumasi on Wednesday.

He descended heavily on the NDC for “having little faith”, thus always describing NPP's better policies and plans for the country as unrealistic, stressing that whatever is in the NPP manifesto could be realized.

“The free education at the Senior High Schools (SHS) among a host of other policies and programmes in the NPP manifesto are realistic,” the NPP running mate pointed out.

Since the country was able to implement the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS), Capitation Grant and others with virtually a weak economy, he expressed optimism that whatever the NPP wants to implement would be successful now that the economy is booming.

He said it is high time Ghanaians stopped downplaying their abilities and rather believe in their capabilities because he foresees a brighter future for the country with the NPP in charge of affairs.

Considering the good foundation laid by the Kufuor administration, Dr. Bawumia observed that Ghana is on the brink of an economic breakthrough and urged the populace to start believing in themselves and work assiduously towards a good future.

“We can do what the other countries have done or even do better than them if we believe in our abilities,” he said, adding that countries such as Singapore and Malaysia have broken away from poverty to join the comity of wealthy nations due to the trust they had in themselves.

However, he was quick to remind the Ghanaian populace that the country would not attain the economic prosperity that it hopes to achieve if it pays little attention to educating the citizenry and improving the human resource capacity of the people.

Dr. Bawumia therefore proposed that Ghana prioritizes education, saying, “The country now needs courageous leadership who would take ambitious policies to totally uproot illiteracy from the system”, maintaining that it is the reason why the NPP would make SHS education free.

The ex-Deputy Governor of the Bank of Ghana expressed delight about the state of Ghana's economy, disclosing that due to sound and better economic polices implemented by the NPP government the country's Gross Domestic Product (GDP) has quadrupled from less than $4 billion to $16 billion within almost eight years.

Due to the stabilization of the economy by the NPP government, he continued, Ghana's stock market is currently the best in the world.

The press conference was under the topic, “Why the NPP is the best party to manage the success of Ghana's economy”.

With the oil find and its expectant booming of the economy, he warned the electorate against the danger of voting the NDC back into power, saying “the NDC does not have the expertise to properly manage Ghana's economy”.

Dr. Bawumia appealed to the electorate to retain the NPP in power come December, since it is the only viable party which has demonstrated its capability to expertly manage Ghana's economy.

On NPP's plan to curb unemployment among the youth, he said a link would be created between the universities and industries so that the students would perform research work for the latter whilst in school, and that with this link, the students could easily get access to jobs after graduating.

He added that the economy would be expanded and sustained and this would automatically create employment for the citizenry especially the youth.
The NPP government, he said, would build three new public universities in the Brong Ahafo, Eastern and Volta regions, indicating that each of the universities would cost the country $20 million.

On housing, he noted that plans are afoot to work hand-in-hand with private firms to build 50,000 affordable houses across the country annually.

Dr. Bawumia, who was completing a four-day tour of the Ashanti region, stated that the NPP is winning the impending elections, stressing, “Our support base in the country keeps maximizing as the days go by, even in the traditional NDC areas”.

Still on the chances of the NPP in the upcoming polls, he said the massive achievements of the NPP “are our trump card and this, coupled with Nana Addo's better vision, would do the trick for the NPP”.

Present at the press briefing, held at the Georgia Hotel, were Mr. E.A. Owusu Ansah, Madam Patricia Appiagyei among a host of party bigwigs in the region.