Stop the fake promises – MP blasts Akufo-Addo

The Member of Parliament for the Banda constituency, Ibrahim Ahmed, has chastised NPP flagbearer Nana Akufo-Addo for making "vague promises."

The MP said Nana Addo is either out of touch with the real challenges facing the Ghanaian economy - which is now less donor dependent because of its middle income status - with reference to the huge demand and is raising hopes on things he does not have the capacity to fulfill.

The MP who was responding to Nana Addo’s recent tall list of promises during his encounter with Ghanaians at a fundraising dinner in London, organised by the UK branch of the Young Executive Forum, blamed his advisors for overrating his capabilities and yet confess secretly that he lacks the wisdom and commitment to do what he claims he can do.

“Nana Addo is going round making all kinds of promises to Ghanaians both here and abroad and yet we all know what that man can do and what he cannot do. We do know he’s capable of dividing the country,” Ahmed told Accra-based Okay FM.

“We know he will be a vindictive leader but I am not sure he can reduce corporate taxes, scrap some taxes and so on and create the paradise he’s going round telling me he will. He should move away from simply reading the script that are written for him and get a better grasp of what governance is all about.”

The 72-year-old NPP flagbearer said he will completely depart from the failed policies of the Mahama government which as he puts it have brought untold hardships to the average Ghanaian.

“My approach is going to be different from that of John Mahama. It is not going to be tax, borrow and spend. My priority will be to reduce the cost of doing business to help small scale enterprises grow, and to make the Ghanaian economy become globally competitive. We are opposed to government measures that cripple businesses and cause unemployment. My intention is to reduce corporate tax rate, abolish VAT on Financial Services, remove duties on the importation of raw materials,” Nana Ado indicated.

But the Banda MP who is also the Second Deputy Majority Chief Whip said Nana Addo’s promises cannot be backed by his tracked record when he was in government.

“What did he Nana Addo do for his constituents when he was an MP for almost 12 years? Not even a gari processing factory and yet he has the moral right to promise turning Ghana into an industrial hub. Wasn’t he one of the 19 member cabinet that saw to the setting up of the Ayensu starch factory? What happened to that factory? It collapsed under a government he served and yet this man is going round promising heaven just because he wants to be President at all cost,” he said.

He advised Nana Addo to forget about ever becoming president and join hands with President Mahama to continue building more factories in line with his vision of turning the country into an industrial hub of Africa if indeed he genuinely wants to also support industry.

Political watchers said while Nana Addo and his running mate Dr Mahamudu Bawumia are right when they say governance is not propaganda, the flagbearer must accept Ghanaians are not gullible when he builds castles in the air. According to these critics, while Nana Addo is touting some of the achievements under the eight-year regime under Kufuor he should also be reminded of these facts which Ghanaians have still not forgotten.

Signing of a loan agreement written in German without knowing and understanding the terms and conditions only for the then Finance Minister Osafo Marfo to make the excuse that he did not understand German.

The IFC loan scam whose address ended up at a hair dressing salon in London and the CNTCI loan, signing an agreement with a Brazilian company to take over Valco, subsequent Parliamentary approval only for the original Brazilian company to distance itself less than 24 hours after it was approved, 1.5 billion Cedis spent on diaries alone during the Ghana @ 50 celebrations.

Buying locomotives from the high interest $750 million Eurobond facility when there was not an inch of railway line. “How does he compare that to Komenda Sugar factory?” the MP queried.