Dan Botwe: Ghana suffering from bad leadership

A leading member of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) says until Ghanaians assume an aggressive posture against corruption, it will continue to be an albatross around the necks of the citizenry.

“As a nation we should be angry; but if we keep quiet it will keep going on and politicians will continue to take us for granted. If that continues leadership will not change; we should be bold to speak if somebody is doing the wrong thing,” Hon Dan Botwe, NPP Member of Parliament for Okere constituency opines.

According to him, “any project that a government commences and is neglected by another government that takes over is corruption…they want to give the contracts out so that they can get their share. It is a selfish attitude on the part of government but unfortunately we reward them by voting for them again.”

Speaking on the last edition of Peace FM’s morning show ‘Kokrokoo’, Hon Dan Botwe also bemoaned the attitude of politicians to seek for re-election when they have not served even half of their first term in office. To him, it is a sign of arrogance if an elected president starts thinking of re-election in less than two years into his tenure.

“What he should be doing is to concentrate on the work he assumed office to do…We should stand up strongly against corruption and that will make them stop…It is arrogance; it is means you are taking the people for granted. Why don’t you do the work and if the people are satisfied with you, they can vote for you. What will happen if you are not president?

Hon Dan Botwe, who once served as General Secretary of the NPP, called for the strengthening of political parties so corruption can be efficiently fought against. He wondered why a political party, upon whose ticket a presidential candidate won an election, has virtually no say in the running of the government. He dared any president who felt political parties were irrelevant in governance to disown the party he was elected to serve as flagbearer and run an election as a independent candidate.

“The best organization that can be used to fight corruption is the political party itself. If somebody is doing the wrong thing in the party they should be bold to say it…unless we do that, we will continue to swim in corruption,” he added.