Managing Editor of the Insight newspaper, Mr. Kwesi Pratt has expressed disgust at what he sees to be a desperate and meaningless attempt by the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) to politicize the private transactions of a businessman and to also mudsling President John Dramani Mahama.
The NPP, on Tuesday, launched a full-frontal assault on the Mahama-led NDC government, calling on the electorate not to renew the NDCs mandate saying a vote for the current administration is "a vote for corruption, lies and debts".
Addressing a press conference in Accra, the NPP catalogued a litany of botched agreements involving President Mahama, and accused him of losing for the nation, huge sums of money in pursuit of those deals which the NPP described as questionable.
Deputy Communications Director of the NPP, Yaw Buabeng Asamoah, also alleged that the Social Security and National Insurance Trust (SSNIT), has been forced by the President to use funds of suffering Ghanaian workers to retire a GH¢57.2 million debt owed by his brother, Ibrahim Mahama, to struggling Ghanaian bank, Merchant Bank.
Mr Buabeng Asamoah explained that SSNIT, which held a 98% stake in the Merchant, in August this year, sold 75% of its stake to South African Bank, First Rand. At the time of the sale, Merchant Bank was reeling under some GH¢330 million debt, with Ibrahim Mahama being the largest debtor, contributing 19.2% of Merchant Bank’s total indebtedness.
“What this deal, struck under President John Dramani Mahama means is that the suffering workers of Ghana have been forced to swallow the bad debts incurred by some business people so that those business people can go on enjoying their life of luxury, including flying around in their private jets…The pension of Ghanaian workers have been sacrificed to pay off debts that they knew nothing of so that some few people could continue having access to their privileged lives of comfort and opulence,” Mr Buabeng Asamoah noted.
But Mr Pratt considers the NPPs pronouncements at the press conference as not logical.
To him, he is not surprised that the NPP, in their desperation for power is picking up on President Mahama’s brother by bringing to the public eye his (Ibrahim’s) acquisition of a loan from Merchant Bank to keep his business running. He dismissed as falsehood, claims that Ibrahim Mahama secured the loans under the NDC and added that it is the NPP which should “bow their heads in shame” since the facilitation of the loan occurred under their administration.
“Ibrahim obtained this loan under NPP and not NDC…I think the time has come for us to see business deals as business deals…If Ibrahim takes a loan from Merchant Bank and is not recovered and so on, there are procedures for dealing with this matter rather than this attempt to politicize it,” he stated.
The senior journalist argued that based on the facts put out by the NPP, Ghanaians need to halt the opposition party from going ahead with their “cheap politicking” rather than allow them to disparage others.
Speaking on Metro TV’s Good Morning Ghana programme, Mr Pratt posited that it was farfetched for the NPP to tag President Mahama as corrupt for playing a role in the STX deal. He continued that it was unfortunate that there are calculated attempts by the NPP to throw “mud and anything” to demean the integrity of their opponents.
“To say that because the STX didn’t go through the president is corrupt is farfetched…it is an indication of desperation. It shows clearly that they are desperate, they are clutching at straws, they want to throw mud, they want to throw anything they can get to in other to get to power and that is most unfortunate…it should not be tolerated in our politics. What is this? I’m so disgusted by this statement which was made yesterday…meaningless-baseless statements, just calculated to throw mud,” he fumed.
