Explaining the NPP philosophy

The Statesman can be accused of focusing attention on ideologies currently, most notably on the ruling party's motto of 'Development in Freedom.' Indeed, Qanawu’s de profundis view is that there has been very little of ideas and philosophy driving this country’s politics and one of the consequences of that is our quirk to de-intellectualise issues, leaving the people exposed to the vagaries and folderol of propaganda.

After more than six years in office, the Kufuor government is seasonable for a forensic test. In Qanawu’s view, the New Patriotic Party sees and respects the instrumental role of freely functioning markets in facilitating economic growth or the intrinsic value of individuals’ freedom to engage in voluntary exchange. As Amartya Sen would have put it, fundamental to the doctrine of Danquah-Busiaism is the principle that freedom is the primary end as well as the means to development. It is a participatory freedom-centred approach to economics and of the pursuit of development.

It may not seem too tangible to even some of the core implementers of this ideology, but germane to this is the party’s deep appreciation of how to balance the intricacies of social choice theory and the econometrics of applied development.

The party’s policy, in the thinking of J B Danquah, "is to liberate the energies of the people for the growth of a property owning democracy in this land, with right to life, freedom and justice, as the principles to which the Government and laws of the land should be dedicated in order specifically to enrich life, property and liberty of each and every citizen.”

You may be forgiven to construe this doctrine to mean that the overriding objective is to create a property owning democracy. But, it is in fact broader than that.

The doctrine sees the duty of the state primarily as guaranteeing to individuals who make up the nation substantive freedoms to make them active agents of a positive change for prosperity rather than passive recipients of dispensed benefits.

As the statement ends, “… the principles to which Government and laws of the land should be dedicated in order specifically to enrich life, property and liberty of each an every citizen.”

The party understands liberal economy and democracy to mean that protection of persons and their rightfully acquired property is a central element of both economic freedom and a civil society.

Danquah-Busiaists see the key ingredients of a legal system, for example, as consistent with economic freedom. These are an independent judiciary, an impartial court system, rule of law, and security of property rights. Inherent in that maxim, Development in Freedom, is the uncompromising conviction in the centrality of the well being of humans in economic development.

That well being of each and every individual is seen as both the goal and the means for development, not simply a spurious side effect. This was clear in Dr Busia’s policies and has been more explicit in Kufuor’s, as well, despite occasional hiccups.

Thus, the top-tier objective of the Danquah-Busia philosophy is simply to raise to the level of richness the lives of “each and every citizen.” The party sees the growth of a property owning democracy in freedom as but incidental means of achieving that collective prosperity.

Listening to President Kufuor during his state visit to the UK, he confidently proclaimed at several forums the living ideology of Development in Freedom which he has embarked on in Ghana.

The NPP’s motto is built on the unyielding belief that political and social freedoms are both inherently desirable. A logical follow on from that concept, M President, is the acceptance that individuals are not free if they are hungry, illiterate, homeless or ill.

It sees civil liberty and human rights as, in fact, conducive to economic growth and intrinsic to the objective of development.

Development in Freedom only works when there is equity in opportunities. Access to education and skills are essential freedoms because they enable the capability to self-consciously choose the life one has reason to value. The NPP’s budgetary decisions over the years of voting substantial public expenditure on programmes that would provide avenues for self development is premised on the Sen principle that it directly increases freedom and because it indirectly increases economic freedom by increasing the income at people’s disposal.

Amartya Sen, the 1998 nobel laureate whose 1998 book Development as Freedom, published six years after the NPP motto was launched, has done a good job in providing the NPP the theoretical framework for the manifestation of the party’s motto.

He stresses, for instance, the importance of female literacy (and female empowerment and labour force participation more generally) both because of the direct impact on women’s effective freedom and because it is the surest route to long run stability of the world population.

His argument for freedom is seen by even his critics as a powerful one, because it ties together both direct and indirect benefits.

However, because his vision of personal freedom is one of individual capabilities, his vision of a politics that maximises freedom cannot be one of a minimal state, whose only role would be to enforce private property rights. Since such a state would leave unprotected the capabilities of the disadvantaged.

At a recent workshop for the NPP youth wing organised by the UK’s Conservative party, John Boadu explained to Qanawu that the NPP shares Tory principles, including small government, “except we are yet to practise it!” he conceded. But, then Qanawu thought that juncture of ideological parting of ways between the two parties should be seen as deliberate and informed.

Mr Kufuor recognises that Ghana is at a stage of her development where the state cannot choose not to interfere in some climacteric areas.

The NPP’s policies are strong on social responsibility of the state in education, skills training and health care. The Ghanaian state has no choice but to invest in the nation’s social capital for economic development. It is only then that a society can be built where freedom is seen in the form of individual capabilities to do things that a person has reason to value. In London, the President made it clear that his party believes the Singapore, China and Malaysia models are not the only ones for the developing world. There is more to the virtues of development than, say, Lee(Kuan Yew)ism or Mahathirism. The Singapore model has been oxymoronically described as benevolent dictatorship. Others have described it as an economy that uses capitalist means to attain socialist ends.

The way for the Tiger economies has been loud on economic freedom but very shy on political freedom and civil liberties. India, until recently, was, on the other hand, a case where political freedom went along with severely limited economic freedom.

The often dependable Wikipedia has this to say about Benevolent Dictators: “Most dictators’ regimes unfailingly portray themselves as benevolent, and often tend to regard democratic regimes as messy, inefficient, and corrupt.

Additionally, many dictators may attempt to openly spread misinformation about their benevolence in an attempt to create a personality cult.”

It continues, “Like many political classifications, the title of benevolent dictator suffers from its inherent subjectivity. Such leaders as Alexander the Great, Ioannis Metaxas, Lee Kuan Yew, Jerry Rawlings, Benito Mussolini, Julius Caesar, Oliver Cromwell, Augusto Pinochet, Napoleon Bonaparte, Sadam Hussein, Francisco Franco, Rahimuddin Khan, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, Kenneth Kaunda, Anwar Sadat, António de Oliveira Salazar, Juan Perón, Fidel Castro, Kaiser Wilhelm II and Edward Gierek have been characterised by their supporters as benevolent dictators.”

From independence in 1965, and under Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, in 20 years Singapore’s economy grew eightfold. Average income per capita rose more than fourfold. The percentage of families living in poverty dropped to 0.3% (in the US it is near 20%).

As one observer notes, to produce his economic miracle, Lee Kuan Yew interfered with every aspect of Singaporean life. To control population growth, he decreed that women having third-or-more babies would get shorter maternity leave, higher hospital charges, and less income tax relief.

That is not the model we have chosen. We may cherish our freedom but we must also cherish our freedom to do the things that enable us the freedom to aspire to and attain greater heights and when attained to maintain the heights, detaining our old sense of complacency and mediocrity in the forgivable past. When last Thursday The Statesman wrote an editorial - Development in Freedom a New Paradigm? – calling for the President to be bolder if real, deep success is to be achieved, we were simply stating that Ghana would continue tinkering with its prosperity attempts unless we remove from the equation the freedom to cheat society, be it by intent or incompetence.

Singapore took a bold decision which required all workers to save 25% of their salaries, with their employers matching that amount, and the money claimable only after the age of 55.

Lee Kuan Yew had a firm grip so it was easy for him to implement it. But, the position we have taken is to allow dissent to persist with explanation and implementation.

The bottom line was that the government of Singapore invested that money into a Central Provident Fund, with which roads, schools, hospitals, and especially housing, were built.

The beautiful, identical 16-story housing blocks you see across the city, each with its recreation centre, swimming pool, shopping centre, community centre, and school, were built from this fund.

After building up a huge supply of housing, the government then started to allow people to dip into their savings before age 55 to buy their own flats. Currently an estimated 80% of families in Singapore own their homes. A property-owning democracy is now firmly in place there.

We, for our cause, say the chains of poverty, social deprivation, lack of economic opportunities, tyranny and suppression of opposing views must all be removed.

What we cannot fail to acknowledge is that even to guarantee the very freedoms that we shout aloud that we cherish, we ought to not compromise in enforcing the law or, in other words, ensuring the rule of law. The rule of law also requires positive compliance from society as well as from the state. h