Ghana's political system dominated by corrupt powers - Prof Gyimah-Boadi

The Afrobarometer network, headed by Professor Gyimah Boadi, has revealed in its latest report, unfortunate realities of Ghana’s political system and how it has been marinated in corruption for a long time.

In a report read by Professor Gyimah at the 14th ‘Kronti ne Akwamu lectures’, he revealed that some of the distortions included the uneven representation of people per Members of Parliament and gerrymandering, which implies the demarcation of constituencies in favour of political parties.

“In the worst case, that is, Ketu South, the MP there represents a voter population that is ten times more than the MP for Sekyere South, Afram Plains. The MP for Dome Kwabenya represents about nine times more voters than the MP for Salaga North. Yet each of them has one vote in any issue in parliament,” he sorely revealed. The redundancies of local community leaders, such as District Chief Executives and Mayors was also mentioned in the report, especially because of the constitutional exclusion of those groups.



Professor Gyimah also lamented the extravagance displayed during political campaigns and the lack of appropriate accountability seeking systems to check that all rules are followed during these times, even by the Electoral Commission.

He said, “We have read reports that our presidential campaigns receive donations from leaders of cleptocratic regimes – ones in Congo Brazzaville, Guinea Bissau, Equatorial Guinea and from domestic and foreign money bags with personable agenda.

“We have also read reports of the major political parties making official payments in cash. Which of course is untraceable and victorious parties paying thank you monies to the Electoral Commission.”

According to him, the unfortunate consequence of such actions would be ruling parties, making decisions in favour of those donors, to the detriment of the ordinary Ghanaian. The reality is not lost on the people most affected by it - Ghanaians - except on a many occasions where they decide that looking away is better than taking action.