Akufo-Addo government’s huge-dollar scandals have made his regime the most corrupt – Azeem

Anti-corruption campaigner Vitus Azeem has argued that the administration of President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has been the most corrupt in Ghana ever since Ghana featured in the corruption perception rankings of Transparency International, the Corruption Perception Index (CPI).

Mr Azeem, a former Executive Director of the Ghana Integrity Initiative(GII), a local chapter of Transparency International, lamented that corruption worsens as governments come and go.

“My view has always been that with the case of government, any new government is more corrupt than the previous government. With this government, the scandals are in huge dollars, not cedis…But scandals involving huge dollars of contracts awarded and some of them because of noise, they have to backtrack. So definitely you don’t even have to ask the question. I think this administration is the most corrupt since the inception of the CPI,” Mr Azeem explained.

While in opposition, the New Patriotic Party(NPP) and its presidential candidate at the time Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo campaigned mainly on fighting corruption and being accountable. But after assuming the reins of power, Ghana has ranked low on the Corruption Perception Index, scoring 43 out of 100.

For Mr Azeem, corruption can be made unattractive when persons caught are prosecuted and appropriately punished.