Ghana's new President Kufuor faces brief honeymoon: analysts

Ghana's new President John Kufuor must act fast to maintain the momentum for "positive change" -- the campaign slogan that inspired the country's first democratic transition since independence -- analysts say.

Kufuor, convincingly elected last month in a vote widely seen as an indictment of the 19-year reign of Jerry Rawlings, must consolidate the goodwill he generated both at home and abroad with quick action on urgent economic issues.

The new president said so himself in his inaugural address on Sunday: "The spontaneous joy and feeling of goodwill that has been in the country since (the elections) should not be allowed to disappear without translating into tangible improvements in the lives of our people."

The defeat of Rawlings' National Democratic Congress (NDC) in the landmark vote was blamed on a variety of factors including complacency, the ailing economy and accusations of corruption and financial mismanagement as well as a legacy of human rights abuses.

The west African country of 18 million people has been beset with high inflation and unemployment, a severely devalued currency and a chronic budget deficit, exacerbated by plunges in world prices for Ghana's top two export earners gold and cocoa.

Kufuor shied away from bold pledges to bring about immediate economic benefits, saying as he promised to launch a "golden age of business" that this would "transform the lives of our people within the next decade."

But the new government would be wise to take certain unpopular decisions "sooner rather than later, especially as they can blame the previous administration," a western diplomat said Monday.

The Rawlings administration was reluctant for example to improve its bottom line by raising the price of gasoline (petrol), which is dirt cheap at less than a dollar a gallon, during an election year.

The financial world will be watching closely as Kufuor makes his first fiscal policy moves, the World Bank representative here, Peter Harrold, told AFP.

He must "make sure that a set of policies and programs is in place to ensure the support of the international community. The big issue is the fiscal position," Harrold said.

The new president has promised a "fiscally very prudent regime and is committed to bringing it (the deficit) down dramatically. Hopefully that is good news," he added.

On the diplomatic front, prospects are rosier for Ghana, which joins a small fraternity of African countries that can boast mature democracies.

Olusegun Obasanjo, the democratically elected president of regional powerhouse Nigeria, was a guest of honor at Kufuor's inauguration, where he said: "Ghana will be making a significant contribution to the march of democracy in Africa."

Also present at the occasion was Obasanjo's predecessor Abdulsalami Abubakar, Nigeria's last military leader who paved the way for the return of democracy to their country in 1999.

Kufuor, who said he had been given a mandate to "renew our pride and self-esteem" assured Ghanaians and the world on Sunday: "Multi-party democracy is here to stay in our country."

As for Rawlings, an ex-president now at a youthful 53, he has been promised the respect due to a former head of state, as well as a generous retirement package including 150 percent of his last salary and a long list of perks.

He has accepted an invitation from compatriot Kofi Annan, the UN chief, to become a roving ambassador to promote voluntarism, and at home he wants to fight malaria.

Kufuor, for his part, was not thinking of mosquitoes when speaking to an allAfrica.com correspondent about his security concerns, recalling the 1981 Rawlings coup that chased him out of a government job: "Once bitten, twice shy," he said.