Failure of politicians, creating national disillusionment - Prof. Sawyerr

Accra, May 12, GNA - Professor Akilagpa Sawyerr, Member of Council of State, on Wednesday lamented that politicians in the country have failed to respect their electoral mandate, which is gradually creating disillusionment.

He said that "Political parties over the years have failed to respect the purpose of politics substituting it with personality politics, foot soldier mandate and generally becoming electoral machinery". Prof. Sawyerr was speaking at the Second Ghana Speaks Public Lectures, organised by Institute for Democratic Governance (IDEG) in Accra on Wednesday.

He said the Ghanaian political system was now dangerously evolving into personality arrangement for capturing electoral power after which "they go to sleep until the next elections contrarily to the tenets of the Political Parties Law".

Prof. Sawyerr challenged democratic stakeholders not to gloss over events, saying "Even though the international community is touting our democratic successes, we should not be complacent; we all saw the fragility of the democratic system, as a nation we were close to plunging into an electoral conflict.

"It would serve us no good if we sit down without analysing the situation critically, now that elections are over we must honestly identify the problems. We need to examine the pros and cons of Election 2008, without naming names and without political lenses for us to learn our lessons to avoid similar problems in Election 2012,".

Prof. Sawyerr emphasised that if Ghanaians fail in the electoral process, mistakes that were committed during Election 2008, may be repeated in Election 2012 but they people may not be the second time lucky. The lecture, organised on the theme: "Managing Competitive Politics: The Winner Takes All Rule, Democracy and Development", is being delivered by Professor L. Adele Jinadu, University of Lagos, Nigeria, an internationally renowned political scientist and former member of National Electoral Commission of Nigeria.

The discussant included Mr. Kwame Painim a renowned Ghanaian economist and an astute politician and Dr. Emmanuel Akwetey, Executive Director of IDEG.

The lecture was to promote critical assessment of the theory and practice of the winner-takes-all rule and its relevance to the strengthening of national cohesion and accelerated development of the country. It was attended by political party representatives, parliamentarians, ministers of state, Council of State members, media practitioners, public servants, members of the diplomatic community, traditional authorities, academia, and members of the civil society among others. Dr. Akwetey noted that the winner-takes-all rule had recently stirred mixed emotions and generated intense debate as its application to democratic governance in the Fourth Republic had had more negative than positive effects.

He said the political transitions of 2001 and 2009 portrayed the winner-takes-all rule of politics in particularly negative light as divisive and harmful to inclusive governance. Dr. Akwetey argued that in practice the winner-takes-all rule promoted exclusionary and retributive politics that needlessly intensified political tension in the country and undermined national cohesion.