Flashback: Dumsor is a wisdom problem - Mensa Otabil

About 5 years ago when Ghana was experiencing severe power crises under the erstwhile John Mahama government, the General Overseer of the International Central Gospel Church (ICGC), Dr. Mensa Otabil, described the energy crisis as a “wisdom problem”.

According to the preacher man, the problem facing Ghana at that time had nothing to do with money.

Preaching on one of his famous sermon titled ‘Wisdom’ on Sunday November 23, 2014, at ICGC Christ Temple in Abossey-Okai, Dr. Otabil, who was very vociferous about the country’s power crises by then, stated that the country's problem was not about launching a spaceship to Mars but a simple electrical problem.

Dr. Otabil explained that the test of wisdom is not the theory as Ghanaians believe in PhDs but rather the ability to do the practical work.

Although Dr. Otabil has gone ‘AWOL’ on the current issues facing Ghanaians in recent times, his statements some five years is worth revisiting especially when the country has gone back to the days of intermittent power cuts popularly known as ‘Dumsor’.

Read the statements by Mensa Otabil below:

“…I think we should be able to design solutions for the electricity failures in Ghana.

“At least we are not being asked to land a spaceship, we are not being asked to go to the moon or to go to Mars, just fix electricity problem. The problems facing us are wisdom problems, they are not money problems.

“In this part of the world, we believe in PhDs. He went to Oxford, he went to Cambridge, he works with the United Nations…. I don’t know why people believe in the United Nations so much. He works with the World Bank, he is IMF, he must have the solution; who told you? The test of wisdom is not the theory, the test of wisdom is: does it work?

“How can somebody who has never been able to feed himself be in government and feed people?

“Because if you can’t put food on your own table, you’ve never built any structure, you’ve never worked, how can you feed other people?

“The Ghanaian Supreme Court is British, Parliament is Chinese, and the Presidential Palace is Indian, so when somebody comes and he looks at all our wisdom, he asks, who are these people. Are they Indians or they are Chinese?”