Mahama likely to harm local industries
By Phyllis D. Osabutey
THE NEW Patriotic Party (NPP) says President John Dramani Mahama lacks the integrity to lead Ghanaians, because he is accessible to foreign investors to the disadvantage of that of Ghanaians.
According to the Deputy Communications Director of the NPP, Mr. Yaw Boaben Asamoah, “President John Dramani Mahama is noted for giving access to every businessman, so long as you are not Ghanaian.”
Elaborating further, he said: “Whilst GREDA members were knocking at his Castle door for audience, he walked past them and flew all the way to Korea to give STX Korea access to a $10 billion housing deal at an unprecedented inflated cost, making that deal probably the most corrupt international loan agreement ever signed by any government in Ghana.”
He noted that after President Mahama had personally negotiated the controversially corrupt deal, he pushed his National Democratic Congress (NDC) Members of Parliament to pass the $1.5 billion STX suppliers’ Credit Agreement for the construction of a mere 30,000 housing units, most of them one-bedroom flats for the security agencies.
He added that an additional $264 million of free money was thrown to the Koreans for something called “political risk insurance”. In his view, “the only political risk that Ghanaians need to insure themselves against is an NDC government, led by John Dramani Mahama.”
Addressing members of the media at the NPP headquarters in Accra on Tuesday, Mr. Asamoah based his presentation on what he called “PR gimmicks and media stunts” of President Mahama and the NDC.
According to him, “The NDC is spending obscene millions of Ghana cedis on billboards, flag posts and expensive vinyl posters, in a desperate attempt to deceive Ghanaian voters once again on December 7, 2012.”
Of particular worry to the NPP is the latest billboard, one of which is placed in front of the Police Headquarters in Accra, describing President Mahama as “accessible, decisive and action-driven.”
Mr. Asamoah said these descriptive words were “empty terms”, adding that when the STX failed, President Mahama did not turn to Ghanaian contractors, but “looked down to South Africa to bring GUMA.”
“True to his new propaganda as ‘Action-oriented’, with the GUMA housing deal also failing, he has now turned to a dubious group of Nigerians, with a record in Nigeria of running away with public funds, to now build us houses, and again, at inflated costs,” he said.
The NPP also questioned President Mahama’s description as being decisive, saying “he could not take a decision when he was being asked to contest for the leadership in 2006, saying he was preparing to go to South Africa to study for his PhD.”
The Deputy Communications Director further indicated that President Mahama again, said no, when Professor Mills approached him to be his running mate. Thus, “others had to decide for him, with his refusal letter citing a PhD programme in South Africa, being torn up by another person,” he stressed.
“Today, by a very unfortunate accident of history, John Dramani Mahama is our caretaker President, who, in his wisdom, has attributed this sad accident of history to wisdom of God. God sincerely deserves better,” he said.
He further stated: “In John Dramani Mahama, Ghana has a President who suffers from a chronic case of indecisiveness.”
In his view, President Mahama himself attests to being indecisive in the last paragraph of his book titled ‘My First Coup d’etat’, by stating: “All the decisions I have made in my life were regularly plagued with doubt. It can be challenging to sustain that feeling of the hope or the belief that things will turn out for the best.
“Again and again, I felt like that boy Dramani, on the bicycle going downhill fast without any brakes, and not knowing which way to turn.”
The NPP said the NDC did not deliver a single item they promised under the 2011 ‘Action Year’ catch phrase. To them, the NDC did not even start, not the STX, Cape Coast stadium, Kotokuraba market, eastern corridor road, or the Tamale airport, and none of the jobs that they promised.
“Instead, what they delivered was hundreds of millions of dollars of action on judgement debts, most of which came with serious question marks, steeped in either gargantuan theft or reckless disregard for the use of public funds.”
This is why Ghanaians were now getting poorer, with the high cost of living, while unemployment was destroying the youth, Mr. Asamoah explained.
“They have simply lost touch with the concerns and problems of the ordinary Ghanaian,” he added.
He said the NDC government had spent more money in less than four years than what President Kufuor or President Rawlings spent in each of their eight long years. The NDC slogan, ‘Working for you’ means, “Working for Woyome, CP, Waterville, Rockshell, Armajaro, Africa Automobile, ISOFOTON, and other entities willing to give them a generous cut of the deal.”
In another matter, the NPP said South Africa’s FirstRand was paying 746.2 million rand (US$91m) for a 75% stake in Merchant Bank Ghana to expand its presence on the continent.
The NPP believes that the deal has the approval of the shareholders, mainly the Government of Ghana, and expressed concern that “Merchant Bank, one of the very few remaining Ghanaian banks, was collapsing, reeling under some GH¢330 million of loans, much of which has been turned into bad debts.”
As they pointed out, the Social Security National Insurance Trust (SSNIT), the pension fund, owns 98% of Merchant Bank, with SIC Life owning the remaining 2%.
The suffering workers of Ghana have been forced to swallow the bad debts incurred by some business people, so that those business people can go on enjoying their life of luxury, including flying around in their private jets, the party noted.
Mr. Asamoah alleged that Engineers & Planners Company Limited, a business owned by Ibrahim Mahama, junior brother of President Mahama, with 19.1% or GH¢57.2 million, tops the list of companies owing Merchant Bank.
He said the NPP did not wish the young, very enterprising man ill, but “when your company falls into bad debt and cannot service its loans, and the pension fund of the workers of Ghana are forced by the President, who happens to be your brother, for that pension fund to ring fence and take on your debt, then we have to ask some serious questions.”
“Fellow Ghanaians, President Mahama lacks integrity. A vote for him is a vote for corruption. A vote for Mahama is a sellout of our future. He has nothing to offer to the youth,” he concluded.
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