Buying what we want and begging for what we need

Last week Thursday, I wrote in my column “The Last Uprising” in the “Today Newspaper” telling my Kenyan friends that I was not going to make any excuses for Ghana’s 59th Independence anniversary brochure errors because as Journalists, they know a thing or two about “the printer’s devil” and there was no justification whatsoever for the error infested brochure.

A few days later, President Mahama made the excuse I had avoided. He attributed the errors to “the printer’s devil”. He also asserted that the guest of honor, President Uhuru Kenyatta did not notice the errors. I respect the Office of the President of the Republic Ghana. So the President’s trivialization of the matter constitutes a more critical incident.

One thing that seems to be common to successive administrations since the inception of the 4th Republic is the loss of billions of Cedis to Corruption and Wastage in the economy, as revealed by the Auditor General’s annual reports. And I am particularly disgusted by the failure of successive administrations to implement recommendations of the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament to retrieve stolen monies and punish culprits to serve as a deterrent.

My appreciation of the cost of winning elections in Ghana convinces me that successive administrations have not implemented recommendations of the audit reports because they are deeply involved in the ‘create loot and share” of the tax payers money.

The point at which value for money audits are undertaken for government contracts make me very suspicious. In fact some have been done after agreements have been made and contracts ratified by parliament.

Take the Government of Ghana and Weldy Lamont Rural Electrification contract for example, which produced savings of US$46million after the value for money audit was undertaken albeit, under the auspices of a different administration. Which means had it been done under the same NPP regime, the savings would have been less for obvious reasons. But take a look at how part of the US$46million was applied. It was used to buy luxury cars! What do luxury cars and rural electrification have in common?

Today, under that NDC regime, the Crown Agents have undertaken a value for money audit that should have reduced the Government of Ghana and China Hunan Construction Engineering Group contract sum by $22million. Someway somehow, it was reduced by only $9million. Government is laughing all the way to the bank and some opposition elements are up in arms.

In the political governance context, the electorate expend their votes on political parties they have been orientated to want at elections to form governments but end up begging for needs like jobs, education and health care that the governments they have elected almost always failed to deliver.

After 59 years of independence our most important need is economic independence, which would require changing the fundamentals of the economy from raw material based exports into an entrepreneurial one for industrialization and value added exports for more foreign exchange and positive balance of payment numbers.

But this need seem to be completely lost on the nation because leadership has failed to bring it to the fore as zealously as earlier leaders fought for our political independence with a sense of urgency.

After the state of the nation address, emerged the raging propaganda war between ruling NDC and opposition NPP over who is less of two evils. Before that war could end, the 59th Independence Day celebration was observed with so many errors that have taken away the entire nation’s focus from the critical need of economic independence now!

That, the anniversary brochure was full of mistakes, the President’s speech did not speak to the theme of the anniversary, there was breech of protocol leaving the Kenyan President to wait for over 15 minutes for his car, Journalists covering the anniversary parade were made to climb onto the bucket of a tipper truck for the height needed to take good shots etc. are all altercations that the President must take action to prevent, if he ever gets the privilege to be Commander in Chief at the next parade. It is astonishing that he attributes the error infested brochure to “the printer’s devil”.

While the national discourse majored on these “avoidables” with government communicators pointing to similar blunders in previous regimes, an Appeals Court upheld the High Court ruling that Alfred Agbesi Woyome was not criminally liable for obtaining a GHC 51 million judgment debt reward.

Against the backdrop that the Supreme Court had maintained its ruling that Woyome had no valid contract to warrant the payment because Parliament had not ratified his business transaction if any, with government, people are beginning to ask how public servants from the Ministry of Justice and Attorney General’s Department, through the Ministry of Finance to the Bank of Ghana, paid the money even against the then President of the Republic’s strict directives.

Who is in charge of the nation? And in what direction is he leading everybody? Are we not aware that it is only a transformed economy that would guarantee sustainable employment, quality education and health for all?

Is it not heart wrenching to see people in need of health care, screened on television with their conditions (sometimes disturbing) exposed to the whole wide world to appeal for funds to pay for those health care needs they cannot afford? Is the President really standing on the shoulders of the visionary Osagyefo as he stated at the Independence Day parade? And Are you proud of Ghana at 59?

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