There is this thing going on, orchestrated by the pro-socialists, of the Nkrumah and NDC tradition. Suddenly, historical revisionists are all over the place, spewing lies against the UP Tradition, and blaming it as the main course of Ghana’s woes.
These propagandists sing from the same song sheet, even if they sing in different parts. Yaw Anokye Frimpong, as if reciting poems, as a lower primary kid would during school functions, will lash out lies and jests, saying exactly what he was instructed to say.
Captain Smart will also occasionally interject to urge his guests on. Then another star-performer, Kelvin Taylor, came out with his version, entitled, “NDC and NPP are not the same.”
Responding to Kelvin Taylor, firstly it must be noted that for the over sixty-seven years of our independence, the socialists have ruled Ghana for forty-five years, more than twice, the twenty-two years of pro-capitalists’ rule. And one thing, for twenty-eight years running, the socialistswere in power, with Jerry’s PNDC/NDC going for straight nineteen years. So, if Ghana is in that mess, the blame must fall on the socialists. So, here I agree that NPP and NDC are not the same.
A propagandist as he is, Kelvin listed some projects and developments and labelled them as achievements by the NDC, but deliberately failed to list even one project embarked on by the NPP, for Ghanaians to make comparison.
Hospitals: It is amazing how Kelvin could run away from the Euroget projects, where NPP’s President Kufuor secured loans from for the construction of new hospitals and rehabilitation of some.
At any rate, under the current NPP administration, more hospitals have been built and are being built than ever before. Last year we were told that eighty-eight new district hospitals are also near completion. (https://thechronicle.com.gh/1-76b-agenda-111-projects-at-52-completion/). And this April we were told by Dr. Okoe Boye that 46 hospitals have been fully completed.
(https://www.modernghana.com/news/1309203/over-40-health-structures-completed-26-facilities.html#google_vignette).
Education: The near collapsing of education in Ghana must be attributed to the PNDC/NDC with its unprepared rush into the Junior and Senior Secondary system.
Under the NPP, the following tertiary institutions among others were established: University of Mines and Technology; Ghana Communications Technology University, University College of Agriculture and Environmental Studies, C.K. Tedam University for Technology and Applied Sciences, Simon Diedong Dombo University for Business and Integrated Development Studies and the Akenten Appiah Menkah University of Skills Training and Entrepreneurial Development, among others. That makes it at least six universities established by the NPP, as against the NDC’s four.
The NPP, very concerned about students dropping out along the way due to inability to pay school fees, implemented the Free SHS policy. What has the NDC done?
Transportation: Exactly what does Kelvin mean by saying the Kumasi Airport facelifting and Tamale Airport upgrading were done by the NDC? We all know how these airports looked like during the NDC administration and what they look like now. And what is it to boast for, about KIA Terminal 3? This project cost us over $270 million, an amount which could build ten airports from scratch, in Ethiopia.
Also, the cost of construction of the Kwame Nkrumah and the Kasoa interchanges were overblown.
In fact, all four interchanges executed and completed by this NPP administration, Tema Motorway, Obetsebi Lamptey, Tamale and the mega Pokuase interchange, which is the largest in West Africa, cost $280 million, which is $20 million more than what cost the NDC to construct the Kwame Nkrumah Interchange.
With railways, Kelvin should be educated on the facts. President Kufuor intended to revive and expand railway in Ghana, so he set up a Railway ministry, which started the rehabilitation works, before he exited office. The plans were there for the Eastern corridor railways, but when the NDC came to power, it scraped the Ministry of Railways and it was not until November 2016, that it secured a loan for the Tema-Akosombo railway.
This new administration came and re-established the Railway ministry and got down to work, extending the Tema-Akosombo railways to Mpakadan. So, where is NDC in all this? Kelvin Taylor, should come out and point out railway projects executed by the NDC and their cost.
The expansion of the railway from Akosombo to Mpakadan, which the NDC called a useless venture and condemned it, is part of the Railway Master Plan. (https://flow.db.com/trade-finance/transforming-ghana-s-railway-infrastructure).
Mega Revenue Generating Investments: And, here Kelvin Taylor has no respect for Ghanaians to insult us in the face by mentioning Komenda Sugar factory. Yes, this factory was revamped by Mahama after it was closed down by Rawlings, during the PNDC era. However, what happened? With a $35 million loan from Indian Exim Bank, Mahama revamped the factory which, opened for operations in May 2016.
After only a few text runs, it was shut down. This factory, with no commercial production, was also non-operational when the NDC handed over to the NPP in January 2017. The NPP went on to build the factory from scratch, so where comes the NDC in this matter?
In its handing-over notes to the NPP, the NDC stated that it had completed 46 E-Blocks projects, it never mentioned 200 E-Blocks, as Kelvin Taylor stated(https://www.myjoyonline.com/mahamas-administration-completed-46-e-blocks-not-29-ndc/).
In this case, can we suggest that Kelvin Taylor is rather that dirty pig who swims in mud and has its eyes covered with dirt so it cannot see clearly? Even this figure 46, is very debatable with some people putting the actual number of E-Blocks completed by the NDC, at 29.
As at April, 2024, the NPP government has completed 60 E-Blocks, with fifteen near completion. The NDC government completed only 808 CHPS compound and with the NPP in power, Ghana has over 6,500 CHPS compounds, covering 46% of the country.(Ref: National Library of Medicine: Community-based Health Planning and Services programme in Ghana: a systematic review).
Power Coverage: When it comes to electricity, the NDC cannot play innocent. Ghana experienced four years of dumsor under the NDC. It was a pandemic. Never has this occurred under any NPP regime.
In Conclusion:It is very stupid of Kelvin Taylor to suggest that the NPP was formed based on ethnocentrism, because Akans do not want an Ewe man to command them around. Akans never complained when that Ewe man, Rawlings, forced a prominent Akan chief to carry night soil.
Akans never complained when Rawlings lined up four prominent Akans, some of whom served as heads-of-state in this country and shot them, dead, only to come out over forty years later to confess that they were innocent, after all; but had to be sacrificed to save the lives of over hundred corrupt people.Adding that if he had started executing the real corrupt people, Ghanaians would say it was ethnic cleansing.Which tribe would he have cleansed, then?
Ghana’s local industries were booming before Rawlings came. His AFRC and PNDC days saw him collapsing Akan owned businesses and industries, leaving out non-Akan owned ones, like Mac Coffie’s and Nkulenu. Did Akans complain?
Kelvin Taylor, an Akan, with his self-acclaimed knowledge of everything about Ghana, should know that Akans, especially Asantes and Ewes, especially Anlos, are one because they share blood between them. He should find out about the good relationship between the Asante royal family of Prempeh and the Anlo royal family of Tamaklo, that was sealed with the exchange of princesses.
These two diverse ethnic tribes are one and this should have been so, until politics divided them. With the truth known, instead of finding ways to re-unite Asantes and Ewes, harebrained people like Kelvin Taylor, are using the same politics to further divide them.
Reader, take note of what Kelvin Taylor wrote: “Adu Boahen and the Kufuor click reigniting the NPP in 1992 was not because they have anything useful to offer, but it was because they were Akans who didn’t like the idea of Jerry Rawlings an Ewe man taming almost all of them at the time.” How very stupid to say that!!! Can he state how radical and unruly, Adu-Boahen and Kufuor were, that required them to be tamed by an Ewe man or any other person?
Kelvin Taylor is saying that NPP’s motive is to derail Ghana from its progress path and that NDC always deliver on the core things that bring progress to Ghana. What are the core things that the NDC has uniquely implemented that brought progress to Ghana? What good policies has the NDC put across that uplifted the life of the Ghanaian? The NPP introduced NHIS, pre-natal care and Free SHS among others to help alleviate poverty. The NDC rose against all these.
In 2008, the NDC promised to implement a One-Term-Premium policy on the NHIS, so that everyone, most especially the poor, will not be saddled with payment of annual premium, but pay only one premium for life. It formed government in 2009 and as at 2016, it could not implement it.
And again, read this senseless statement by Kelvin, “You may not like the NDC because of your tribal orientation…” Is he saying that the NDC belongs solely to only one tribe? This party has been led by Ewes, Akans and Northerners. During General Elections, this party acquires votes in all polling stations across the nation. What about that?
If only Kelvin Taylor, could get out of the sewage pool, he is swimming in, wash down properly and make sure he scrubs his face, very well, to clear his eyes, then have them checked by opticians, he will surely see things differently.
Kelvin carries himself about that he always has facts, but in his article, it clearly showed that he does not. He could not even mention a single project the NPP governments executed but rather used the opportunity to be ethnocentric. What a shame! What a celebrated ignoramus who displays his gross ignorance with such pomp and pageantry.
By Daniel Dugan
