Mahama should keep quiet – COCOBOD CEO

The Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana Cocoa Board, Joseph Boahen Aidoo has asked former President John Dramani Mahama to avoid speaking on issues relating to cocoa production in the country.

According to him, the former president is bereft of adequate knowledge and expertise in the Ghanaian cocoa sector.

He avers under the tenure of the Mahama-led government, the Ghanaian cocoa production sector was brought down to its knees when the swollen shoot disease emerged.

Joseph Boahen Aidoo attributed this to the high level of mismanagement and numerous activities of corruption which bedevilled the cocoa sector.

While speaking to chiefs and people of Atobiase in the Wassa East district of the Western Region as part of the Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia’s two-day working visit to the region, he said: “John Mahama should keep quiet, he has little appreciation of how the cocoa sector operates, he’s bereft of ideas, what did he do when the swollen shoot disease ravaged farms.?”

His comments follow recent claims of abandonment of some cocoa roads by the former president.

Mr Boahen Aidoo further insisted that it only took the timely intervention of President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to redeem the image of the ailing cocoa sector.

He said the Akufo-Addo-led government paid huge sums of compensation to cocoa farmers who were greatly affected by the swollen shoot disease.