Beyond Oct. 18, what next?

After the NPP congress to elect Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo Addo as the flagbearer for the 2016 general election we find the Editorial of Tuesday, September 2, 2014 as must repeat message except to change the heading to read:

BEYOND OCT. 18, WHAT NEXT?


Ghana under the National Democratic Congress (NDC) - led governments of both the late President Atta Mills and current President John Dramani Mahama from 2009 has not been a pleasant country to live in despite their continuous claim to a better Ghana agenda.


Businesses have collapsed, with some hardly surviving. The Academia has had troubling times amidst insults from an erring regime.


The Health sector has not been spared with the latest been the outbreak of Cholera at a spate unprecedented in the face of name calling at the Ghana Medical Association.


Organized Labour has on countless occasions registered its displeasure through press warnings and several other engagements all culminating into the first ever MASS ACTION against the government on Economic grounds nationwide.

Even the Basic and Second Cycle schools have tasted their own portion of the poison offered Ghanaians by a regime that by all standards deserved not a renewal of mandate in 2012; with closures and postponement of dates of reopening and paying beyond the routine items on the bills’ list.


Contractors have no jobs to do and are not paid for even the work done under self or pre-financing contracts.


So what really has worked for or is working for this government aside the payment of ridiculous fees under the guise of judgment debts mostly or ‘huhuodious’ contracts whose execution remain a mirage? It does appear the Government of Ghana owes everybody in Ghana without an exception; from Housewives to children in Crèche and Nurseries.


Yes, the sins of the incumbent are thus always many. But let no one make a mistake or be deceived into the unfortunate often thought in Politics that the sins of the incumbent alone can lead to a democratic regime change.


Never has that happened anywhere without the presentation of a superior alternative to the status quo. The opposition in Ghana especially the largest opposition political party, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) must thus take note of this and be minded. You cannot continue to do things the same old way and expect any different results.

Surely it would take a renewed faith backed by a new way of doing things with tact and finesse to change a regime that has brutally engaged in election winning ways instead of governing a nation any better. It thus call also for a deliberate strategy aimed at presenting a united front rather than falling for their cheap victim scheme of ‘they against us’ or better still ‘ALL but ONE’.


Falling into that mould has been the deciding factor of many an election they have won than any other dirty scheme of theirs. Credence to their claims and style has been offered from outside their Party than from inside.


We at the National Forum view, as this nation’s greatest threat, the continuous stay of the NDC in power for yet another four-year term. Yet the most dangerous impediment in the path to regime change is an attempt to clad unto the bogus talk of ‘we have known you for long’, ‘this is the only candidate to attract so called floating voters’ or that ‘only one person has the magic wand to unseat an incumbent whose cup of sins is so full and already overflowing. No! It has never worked anywhere and we must not assume that we are any different species of humans on the face of the planet earth. Nay!


Ghana must awake and work again for her own. That task is not the reserve or repository of any one person. It calls for a concerted collective approach on all matters where we all accept and believe that “No one is entirely right” nor is “Someone entirely wrong”. It just doesn’t work that way! 2016 would be fiercely contested by the NDC with big loads of weapons that fuel the political campaign machine. Let no one play with funny words that have allowed them overstay their welcome.