NPP implementing NDC manifesto

The Ghana Palaver says the New Patriotic Party (NPP) is copiously implementing policies contained in the Manifesto of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), without giving any credit to the originators of the ideas.

A typical example, the paper says, is the much publicised Forest Plantation Development Programme, which it says, President J.A. Kufuor launched amidst fanfare last Thursday at Ayigbe, a farming community in the Wenchi District of the Brong Ahafo Region.

According to the story, while the NDC in its manifesto (page 29) devoted a whole section on forestry, the NPP said nothing about it in its own document. “One of the measures, the third in the stated order, was for the NDC Administration to launch a Forest Plantation Development Fund to stimulate private investment in commercial forestry”, writes the paper, which adds that President Kufuor in launching the Forest Plantation Development Programme last week, did not give the NDC credit.

The Minister of Health, Dr Richard Anane, is also reported to have a few days earlier opened a course for the local training of physiotherapists, but had also failed to acknowledged picking the idea from the NDC, though it was the only party that had in its manifesto indicated that it will embark on local training of health specialists.

The Palaver, listing a number of other events, among them the homecoming summit, says although top NDC circles do acknowledge the good judgement of the NPP to continue the NDC policies and activities in the spirit of continuity, the ruling party would have been fair in acknowledging their origins.