I almost lost my life fighting graft – Afriyie Ankrah

A former Minister of Youth and Sports under the erstwhile Mahama administration, Elvis Afriyie Ankrah, has said he nearly died fighting corruption as a Minister.

He said that some businessmen and women heavily fund both the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), making it impossible for the two parties to deal with such people in corruption-related issues.

At a conversation on Rethinking Political Leadership in Ghana organised by socialist group, Progressive Intellectuals, on Tuesday, 2 October 2018, he said: “…I was tasked to investigate GYEEDA (Ghana Youth Employment and Entrepreneurial Development) and I found myself in a situation where [I was investigating] people who supported us during the campaign, and they support all parties. When there is time for election, they give monies to both parties, so don’t believe one party, both parties do it”.

“They said we should clean it up and we started cleaning it up, it was so embarrassing and awkward; people who have given you t-shirts and money and all kinds of things and now you are dealing with them. It was almost unconscionable but it had to be done and in the process some of us almost lost our lives because then, there was pressure within the party because you are cutting off the source of funding, for both parties, [and so], they will come after you."

According to him, corruption is systemic and not limited to one political party. For him, the country needs to purge the system and strict mechanisms implemented to check corruption.

“… we have created a system that legitimises and institutionalises corruption and at the same time we say we want to deal with corruption,” he bemoaned.