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Opinion: Why Professor Mills is the answer

Thu, 25 Dec 2008 Source: Tamakloe, Sebastian

‘Small minds talk of people , average minds , talk of events, great minds talk of issues ‘

Paying close attention to the politics that is going on and listening to the ‘arguments’ of the two sides , certain things come out clearly. Ghana has problems and the problems are huge and need urgent and holistic solutions . We need the kind of leadership that will be up to the task . At the moment NDC has a higher number of parliamentary seats . Should we go for a balance and vote NPP presidency or should we opt for a streamline so we can have an NDC Presidency with a working majority in parliament ? The choices are also starkly clear : a free market philosophy called capitalism and practiced as TRICKLE DOWN or a social democracy ; a hybrid of state initiatives and private initiatives . The world itself is in crisis as the ‘trickle down principle’ is in chaos and needs to find new direction . The proponents of these are before Congress asking for bailouts while their CEOs took bonuses of billions of dollars. They were given tax breaks to create jobs , unfortunately we have the highest unemployment in 27 years. The other countries with social democracy economics have been somehow buttressed from the excessive devastation, like Sweden , Holland The question is where does Ghana want go?

Socially we have the conservative NPP led by Nana Akuffo . They seem to have a solution “ DEMONIZE EWES and RAWLINGS . How this gives a solution to the problems we have beats my mind . The US is a diverse country and they use the diversity to advantage . Certain words are completely off the list and punishable by jail terms . These are bandied about freely in Ghana ‘the apple of African democracy’ What does the leadership of the NPP do ? Do we see them restraining the membership from such utterances? Did we see McCain and the US press condemning such utterances? . Did we hear John Mahama even restraining his own leader for certain utterances? . That is leadership , that is responsibility

What is the big picture ? High economic reform starting with agriculture , through industrialization to the protection of minorities with accountability I watched Chelsea and Man United play the other day . There were few real English names . These clubs are highly successful and why not ? They got good leadership and the players are in there on MERIT . Then they play as a team . They have a Vision , a goal . When the players from the Africa are on the field they are protected . They cannot be taunted or called names . There are codes that guarantee these else a penalty . Paintsil was disciplined the other day by his manager for taking a dive . Do we have that kind of leadership and practice from the NPP leadership ?

Economic What philosophy will drive the development engine? Trickle down ? Has it not failed under Thatcher and recently under Bush plunging the world into the worst crisis since 1932 . Will it succeed in Ghana just because we are called Ghana? Do we even have the billionaires to make the investments, or do we have to wait for foreign capital? So what is the essence of independence when economically we are still dominated by foreigners? Are we now going to create a wealthy class who, in turn will then create the jobs ? Will that not create a property owning class at the expense of the majority as slaves ? Is that our desired goal as a free country? Capitalism was built on slave labor and colonization so who will be the ‘new slaves’ and who do we colonize ? So why have these capitalists not created the jobs we need? Why is Valco still lying idle.? Why have we not been able to open up the Alumina plant, why have we not been drilling for our own oil ?The simple answer is we do not have the capacity to operate the capitalist system . We are small players and will remain so unless we have state initiatives and multi state initiatives . If we cannot work across tribal lines , can be work across national lines . Fellow Ghanaians on the 28 th December let us vote in the NDC as we cannot continue with the small minded people with such simplistic ideas . The world is moving on at full speed , let us discard our archaic philosophies of tribal attitudes , unite and harness our resources to the fullest amid respect and dignity for all .

Vote PROFESSOR MILLS , VOTE NDC FOR A BETTER GHANA

Sebastian Tamakloe

Source: Tamakloe, Sebastian