Ghana needs Mahama back to finish his unfinished developmental agenda

Posterity has favourably judged former President John Dramani Mahama after his exit in 2016. Although the exit of Mahama was premature in terms of not completing his constitutionally permissible second term to finish his developmental agenda, it was highly necessary it happen.

This is because Ghanaians have now tasted the bitter side of Akufo-Addo’s style of governance vis-à-vis former President Mahama’s regime. Global Info Analytics’ survey with a section of Ghanaians revealed that the country under Akufo-Addo and Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia is heading in the wrong direction, together with excruciating hardships emanating from poor policy implementation, overborrowing, overspeeding, and escalating corruption and bribery.

This is the complete opposite of what the governing NPP, led by Akufo-Addo, promised Ghanaians to do better than Mahama. This previously overhyped Akufo-Addo-Bawumia-led government has underperformed and cannot boast of any huge national projects successfully executed, unlike Mahama. The stalled national cathedral project and the struggling free SHS policy in particular show a bad legacy for this current Akufo-Addo-Bawumia-led government.

The unprecedented and forward-looking developmental projects in the health, educational, roads, and housing sectors of the economy that were initiated and implemented under former President Mahama earned him the name ‘Nation Builder’. In terms of health infrastructure, Mahama and the NDC constructed and equipped over 900 CHIPS compounds, several health centers, polyclinics, district hospitals, and regional hospitals across the length and breadth of the country.

Specific examples worthy of mention include the 617-bed University of Ghana Teaching Hospital, the 500-bed Military Hospital at Afari, the 386-bed Bolgatanga Regional Hospital, the 250-bed Ashanti Regional Hospital, the 420-bed expanded Ridge Hospital, and the 104-bed expanded Police Hospital.

Regarding the educational infrastructure, the flagship E-Blocks were also built across the length and breadth of Ghana to accommodate growing numbers of secondary school students. Some of these E-Blocks were completed, and others were at various stages of completion before the exit of Mahama in 2016.

With respect to roads, the regime of President Mahama saw improvement in the construction of roads, including the ongoing Eastern Corridor and Cocoa roads. As soon as President Akufo-Addo came into office in 2017, many ongoing hospitals, E-blocks, housing, and road projects were abandoned for the past 7 years, leading to the deterioration of these capital-intensive national developmental projects in the country.

The mess in which we find ourselves now requires an experienced, accommodating, and visionary leader to reset, and that leader is none other than former President Mahama.

Ghana needs Mahama back to finish his unfinished developmental agenda and reset Ghana. Mahama does not need money, fame, or recognition again. He rather desires to reset Ghana and put her on the right path of economic growth and good governance.

Former President Mahama and the current flagbearer of the NDC Party are poised to clean up the economic, social, and environmental mess that created this underperforming Akufo-Addo-Bawumia-led regime.

We need to bring back Mahama and the NDC on December 7, 2024.