Rawlings was a dictator - Agyeman-Duah

Former lecturer and co-founder of CDD-Ghana Professor Baffour Agyeman-Duah has described the late former President Jerry John Rawlings as a dictator.

Speaking about governance on the Class Morning Show (CMS) on Class91.3FM on Wednesday, 31 March 2021, Prof Agyeman-Duah said although Mr Rawlings did his best as the longest-serving head of state in the country, his best was not good enough.

He told show host Kofi Oppong Asamoah that: “Rawlings was there effectively as a dictator, people don’t like hearing that but he was, being a military ruler from 1981 to 1993. Then of course once the constitution came, he became a democratic early elected president.

“He had the longest time ever to serve the nation and I believe he could have done better but given the circumstance, I guess he did his best but his best was simply not good enough so it was good that we transited from his era, 19 years to the new government of the NPP led by Kufuor who did his eight years followed by Atta Mills-Mahama another eight years and we are now currently nursing the eight years of Akufo-Addo.”

Asked if he was happy at the rate of Ghana’s development, Prof Agyeman-Duah noted that the country’s challenge was her inability to manage the economy as it should.

“I think the basic challenge of our democracy is our inability to really get hold of the economy because governments, societies are built on economic development because even a democracy without a strong economic base falter, so it’s important that we find a way to really take hold of our economy and that has been eluding us all these years,” said Prof Agyeman-Duah.

He added: “I haven’t seen any real courageous efforts on the part of any of our previous leaders to get hold of the economy and that is still creating problems for us. Even today as we speak there’s a heavy debate on our economy, the budget, the deficit and all. These are all reflective of a certain fundamental issues that we have not been able to face as a people”.