The Ghana Centre for Democratic Development (CDD-Ghana), according to a myjoyonline report, says the country could soon be plunged into a ‘choice-less’ democracy due to the monetisation of its political landscape.
Quoting the Director of Programme and Policy Engagement at CDD-Ghana, Dr. Kojo Pumpuni Asante, the report explained that when a few rich party members give out huge sums of money to finance campaigns and other party processes, it skews the power dynamics away from elected officials into the hands of the rich few.
This, the myjoyonline report continued, is later carried on into government, where only the views and interests of a handful of people are taken into consideration, and not the national populace.
“It is an existential threat. It is the one thing that is going to damage our democracy. We’re seeing changes in internal party dynamics because of monetisation. More and more, the few people who have money are now able to direct everything in the party even part managers.
“So you can be elected chairman of the party, if you don’t have money in the party, you can decide whatever and nobody will mind you because the people who finance people’s campaigns and whatever are the ones that are going to make the decisions for you and you cannot have any vibrant party that way.
“And if you cannot have vibrant parties you’re going to have bad governments because it is the same dynamics that is brought to the government, and then you have the centralization of corruption and so on that goes on. It’s a very dangerous thing”, the news portal quoted Dr Pumpuni as saying,” Dr. Pumpuni was again quoted as saying.
The monetisation of our politics is an open secret, but nothing concrete is being done to address the issues. The elephant is certainly in the room, but we are just skating around it. The Chronicle, however, admits that the problem is not only associated with Ghana, but the whole of Africa, especially in Nigeria and Kenya. Experts have made a number of suggestions, and chief among them is state funding of the political parties.
However, in our side of the world, immediately the decision is taken for the state to fund political parties, the floodgates will be opened for the formation of new political parties. If the funding is limited to only parties with representation in Parliament too, law suits will start flying all over the place, on the basis that the state is discriminating against the smaller parties.
This is the conundrum that industry players and Dr. Pumpuni should help in resolving. In order to get big contracts among other benefits, those who have the financial wherewithal are pumping million of cedis, if not dollars, to fund activities of a party they feel has the chance of winning national elections to form a government.
As Dr. Pumpuni pointed out, because these businessmen supported the party to come to power, they dictate how the state must be governed, and this is where the danger lies. Gays and lesbians can also finance a political party to come to power so that they can spread their ‘gospel’ to the people. Is this a good thing we should pray for?
The problem at stake is an arduous one, which demands collective participation to deal with it. The monetisation of our politics is also driving away people who have the ideas to lead this country into prosperity. This is a sad development and that is why a solution must be found to the problem at all cost.
