To set the record straight forward, the Tertiary Educational Institutions Network (TEIN) of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) in the University for Development Studies, Navrongo-Campus, wishes to alert Ghanaians on the true genesis of this malicious habit of bribery and corruption in the country.
These pandemonium scourges had their avoidable rebirth under the watch of the self-acclaimed “good moral apostles” (NPPs) who escape the hook of immeasurable justice during the reign of the late Prof. Atta Mills. Our nation aliens and their counterparts in other professional jurisdictions publicly claim that the government is corrupt, we make ill with them in that fallacious allegation. We rather coincide the corruption they orchestrated in the country under the watch of the blatant leadership of their brigadier looters in the early 2000’s, has gradually devoured and eroded the morality of the generality.
Palpably, the most annoying and deceiving among all was how they took Ghana to HIPC to free debt and to build phantom toilet facilities, aftermath borrowed US$1B for no major facilities. As at 2002, Ghana’s HIPC account at Bank of Ghana was credited with about 2,210.97 billion cedis by donor countries such as UK, USA, Netherland, Germany, Italy, Canada, Norway, China and the like.
The then corrupt leadership of NPP claimed they used about 30 billion cedis to construct lecture halls, hostels, bungalows which in reality never existed in our universities. Under former president Kufuor's leadership, Ghana had the poorest feeder roads networks in the country, even though there was about 40 billion cedis allocation to improve feeder roads programme.
The construction of Bolgatanga Regional Hospital, the expansion of 21 health training schools and other health needs received an amount of 59.5 billion cedis but those were phantom initiatives. Today, we cannot visualize the Bolgatanga Regional Hospital and their phantom 21 health training schools. Indeed, the HIPC initiatives should have been a glory to mother Ghana but the nation wreckers only joined the league to create, loot and share. Dramatically, the HIPC programme was a convenient lie by the nation wreckers to justify the claim that former president J.J Rawlings left a collapsed economy. Usually, World Bank and IMF determined the one-size-fit-all debt sustainability ratios, on which ground all African countries were classified as HIPC.
This was by the virtue of the unjust economic order that ensured that exports from developing countries were comparatively cheaper but not due to mismanagement of economies such as Ghana. From 1984 to 2000 Ghana had consistently posted positive growth rate of about 4% which showed that we did not fall into that category of HIPC nations. As mentioned earlier, despite the challenges faced by Ghana in the year 2000, the economy was in a good state of recovery in the final months compared with the debilitating economy crisis the NPP left behind at the close of 2008. Considering the situations, if one needed truly to be described as precarious and badly in need of help then it was the Intensive Care Unit Economy left by Former President John Agyekum Kuffuor, Nana Addo Dunkwa Akufo Addo, Dr. Mahamadu Bawumia, Mr. Osarfo Marfo , among others rather than the recovering economy left behind in 2000.
Notwithstanding that, the redenomination of our currency in 2007 has some unscrupulous interesting revelation, the GHC10 notes counted up to 69 as in the serial number generation. Our attention was drawn to these unscrupulous tactics when other serial numbers started flying everywhere during the 2008 elections. Over GHC2 million was detected in this notorious hoarding process and we were also aware of the indiscriminate GHC50 counterfeits that cost us in excess of GHC1 million to combat as a nation. During the redenomination, the then leadership of Bank of Ghana including Dr Mahamadu Bawumia could not account for the total value of the old currency. What actually happened to the old currency? That was a clear corruption orchestrated by the erstwhile Kuffour’s administration. The decision lies on our choice makers to either bring back corruption or forever reject the canker.
Factually, the brouhaha surrounding the disposal of our 70% share in Ghana Telecom was even brought to light by their own Asikuma-Odoben-Brakwa former MP, Hon. P.C. Appiah Ofori. He alleged that NPP MPs from 2005 to 2009 had collected US$5,000 to approve Vodafone‘s acquisition of 70% share in the state-owned Ghana Telecom. Simply, all the 128 NPP parliamentarians including their high ranking corrupt stalwart, Nana Addo Dankwah Akufo Addo as at 2005 received a bribe of US$640,000 to approve that blatant agreement.
That uncalled-for practice gave Vodafone 70% share in the Ghana Telecom for only US$900 million as at the time we needed less than such amount to prop up the Cedi they destroyed after taking over from the previous NDC government. Hon. P.C. Appiah Ofori , the outspoken MP faced the wrath of his corrupt colleagues in parliament but failed to honour the invitation by NPP’s Disciplinary Committee. When, you distinguish yourself for the truth in the elephant fraternity, then they tag you as an enemy.
In addition, it was quiet degrading to note that a whole president happened to be the chief beneficiary of kickbacks from contractors at the castle. This unprecedented practice was revealed by the then NPP Chairman, Mr. Haruna Essaku on a tape telling NPP supporters. He could not fathom why his car boot was no longer stashed with kickback funds. The president was at a time withholding those funds. This, he said elucidated why he could not provide resources for the running of the NPP. Owning to this honest revelation, Mr. Esseku was held hostage in a hotel and denied the opportunity to attend the NPP Delegate’s Conference at Legon.
We are without any reservation to state emphatically that our patriotic former president, FLT LT. J.J Rawlings got his vindication on his widely circulated comment that his corrupt successor, former president John Agyekum Kuffuor instituted and monopolized corruption during his administration. In fact, the albatross of Ghana’s corruption allegations must forever remain on the neck of the former president, Mr John Agyekum kufuor. As the Head of State he diverted state’s fund for his personal needs, an amount of US$3.5 million and 40 million cedis were siphoned to put up a hotel for his son and renovated his house respectively.
Furthermore, we cannot till date understand why these “apostles of good moral standard” should inject the economy with illicit drug trade. Ghana is now noted for countless facts, to be a de facto country of high drug trafficking especially cocaine due to NPP’s capos continuous and persistent involvement in this morally deteriorating canker. Some few months ago, there was a drug bust at Heathrow Airport of David Kojo Anim-an NPP financial and the owner of Le Baron Hotel at East Legon in Accra-this unveiled his curiously strong connection with the opposition NPP and some of its key stalwarts. This should simply tell us that the drug barons have been into these trades for quite a longer period since they won the 2000 political ticket.
The basis for we Ghanaians to conclude on this hurting practice within the largest opposition party is that, if Joseph Amoateng’s saga and Nana Akufo Addo’s notorious illicit drug scandal are not convincing, then David Anim’s drug bust with its epistles could be a God-given evident to decide for you and the future of mother Ghana. Fellow countrymen and women, are we going to allow these incompetent leaders to take us back to that shambolic cocaine economy for their personal gains? No wonder, Ghanaians rejected them in the 2012 polls which metamorphosed into that infamous figure-massaging election petition.
Some do say that the election petition hearing has come a long way to strengthen our democracy; to us it was a plot to impose the corrupt, Nana Addo Dunkwa Akufo Addo on the NPP. Instead of him (Nana Addo) to hang his shameful political boot, he rather used the court to cover his ever acrimonious ignominies in the name of minimal errors that were bound to happen in any election involving human beings. This is genuinely tantamount to corruption. Hence, the cocaine barons must be shown the exit door again.
Fellow Ghanaians, it is in the light of these unethically motivated corruption practices and other incompetent economic initiatives they deployed under their parochial partisan interest to create, loot and share, that we persistently articulate the causes of our current economic challenges to them.
Meanwhile, the government has also admitted the existence of high level of corruption in recent times. The canker can be seen in areas such as educational institutions, religious institutions, governing bodies and the like. This eventually drains down our moral fabric contributing to the malfunctioning of these institutions. Whilst, others describe corruption as a “natural phenomenon” and, therefore, no mean could melt it down in our body of politic, the Mahama led administration says Ghanaians must choose to combat it or perish, since it has the tendency to jeopardize the fortunes of the nation.
Obviously, when one juxtaposes these two ideologies, putting up empirical measures to arrest the canker stands tall to galvanize resources to tackle our development deficit. As a people of a sovereign state, we must be guided by the principle of probity, transparency and accountability. For this noble reason, H. E. John Dramani Mahama categorically outlines measures in collaboration with his executives and the remaining organs of the government to conquer the nation-dwindling menace.
Among these plans are re-empowerment of EOCO, BNI, CID, CHRAJ and the latest passage of the Anti-Corruption Action Plan Bill into law and cabinet’s approval of the amendment to the Whistle Blower Act to give more protection to private individuals who may volunteer to give crime information to the security services. The forthcoming of the Sole Judgment Debt Commission was of no exception. We need all hands on the deck to pass the formidable “Right to Information Bill” into law, for a democracy without access to information is absolutely meaningless and notwithstanding that, it is tantamount to corruption.
Assiduously, Owning to our dedication and commitment to handling corruption, we have some NDC gurus under the various degrees of legal battles, the likes of Hon. Martin Amidu, a former minister of state, Hon. Abuga Pele, an NDC-MP for Chiana-Paga Constituency among others. Today, we can confirm that the AGAMS Group of companies has refunded the first installment of over GH?14 million to the state under the Ghana Youth Employment and Entrepreneurial Development Agency (GYEEDA).
Again, the Public Account Committee (PAC) of parliament has retrieved dubious amount of Ghana cedis from a number of pre-tertiary institutions and other public institutions in the country. It is remarkable on behalf of the government to save over GHC240 million through the deployment of the Electronic Salary Payment Vouches (ESPV) to rid the public sector of ‘ghost names’. Owning to our commitment to the fight against corruption, Ghana earns the second Millennium Challenge Account.
Also, the fiasco at the 2014 World Cup participatory necessitated the president to set up a commission of enquiry and the latest among them was the BNI exposé at NSS where over GHC7.6 million went to corrupt individuals through non-existent and non-serving service personnel. We were not astonished when the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, David Cameroon said “very honoured chairing a meeting with a leader who is genuinely fighting corruption in his country, John Mahama”.
For the first time in our history to have a president who sets a platform for legal litigations among his own comrades, this unprecedented movement alone tells the electorates that the president, the Joshua of our time, is capable of taking us to the promise land regardless of the recent global economic tensions.
To conclude, instead of superintending political equalization, we challenge our leaders to own up their constitutional responsibility to fighting corruption in all endeavors. In recent times, our outspoken party founder and the first president of the Fourth Republic has spoken on the high level of corruption in the country and task the Mahama led-administration to help curtail the canker. Whereas, former president John A. Kuffour condoned the canker with his widely speculated tolerance for the nation degrading canker, former president J.J Rawlings rather opted for a rigorous fight against it.
We the young democrats of TEIN-NDC are quiet optimistic that his (former president Rawlings) timely advice will receive the necessary collective attention and also appeal to the government appointees to be very much aware of the consequences involved in fighting corruption, for Friedrich Nietzsche once said “whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you”.
The road maps of our arsenal against corruption requires pragmatic measures and all hands, are therefore, invited to put their shoulders to the wheel as far as the battle against this notorious canker is concerned.
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