Prez Mahama must arrest ailing economy — Kwabena Agyepong

The General Secretary of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Mr Kwabena Agyei Agyepong, has called on President John Dramani Mahama to “stop the rot in order to stem the slide into chaos”.

According to the NPP scribe, running a country was a serious business requiring a heightened sense of urgency, service, sacrifice and selflessness.

In a statement to the media yesterday, Mr Agyepong argued that virtually all the social interventionist policies introduced by the NPP administration had been embroiled in massive corruption scandals. 

He mentioned some of the interventionist policies as the National Health Insurance Scheme, School Feeding Programme, Free Maternal Care, Capitation Grant, National Youth Employment Programme, now the Ghana Youth Employment and Enterprenuerial Development Agency (GYEEDA), Affordable Housing, among other initiatives, which have almost collapsed.

In his view, “the incompetence of the Mahama government has attained legendary status, bringing with it a level of despondency, hopelessness and state paralysis unknown in contemporary times. In fact, every aspect of our national life has plunged to new depths.”

According to Mr Agyepong, Ghanaians should have been celebrating with pride the 54th anniversary of attaining Republican status but pointed out that sadly, from being the beacon of hope for the rest of the African continent, the vast majority of our countrymen must have perhaps endured the most depressing week in recent times. 

The statement declared that the week began with the announcement from one of the respected rating agencies, Moody’s, that Ghana's sovereign rating had once again been downgraded to B2, confirming the widely held view that Ghana's economic outlook  was continuing a downward trend. 

“According to Moody’s, the primary driver of the decision to downgrade Ghana's economic rating was the country's high and still rising debt portfolio and our deteriorating debt sustainability. Currently, investor confidence in our economy is at the lowest ebb,” it stated.

The statement said worse was to follow with the bizarre decision to airfreight $3m cash to our footballers in Brazil against all financial administration regulations in the full glare of the international media and in the process exposing our dear nation to international ridicule. 

“The chaos that ensued at the team’s hotel may be scant explanation for the defeat the Black Stars suffered at the hands of a deflated Portugal, culminating in our worst performance in the World Cup, finishing last in our group,” it stated.

The statement said President Mahama's response was to engage in a game of musical chairs by shifting around his blundering ministers instead of the decisive action to punish misdemeanor. 

“To cap a truly extraordinary week, motorists around the country were subjected to acute shortages of petroleum products,” it stated.

“The length of queues at various stations were truly unprecedented. The situation could have been averted if only the government had simply acted responsibly in their dealings with the BDCs, the banking sector, TOR and accepting liability for foreign exchange losses occasioned by the gross mismanagement of the economy by the hapless Mahama government,” the statement added.