Plan to restore names of universities suicidal - Kweku Baako warns Mahama

Editor-in-Chief for the New Crusading Guide Newspaper, Abdul Malik Kweku Baako has raised questions about the quality of advice that has gone into former President John Dramani Mahama’s promise to revert the names of some public universities renamed by the Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo administration.

Speaking on the Wednesday, February 7, 2024, edition of Kokrokoo on Peace FM, Baako said John Mahama may be treading on a suicidal path with such campaign promises.

“It might even be suicidal for you the person advocating such a thing in terms of the area, what they are perceived as. So, maybe there isn’t quality advice going into some of these campaign promises,” he stated.

According to him, such promises could have dire impact on the electoral fortunes of the opposition leader hence his questioning of the quality of advice and thought that went into such a promise.

“It can impact on election outcomes. This is not an issue you put on the front burner and charge people’s emotions on. It could easily backfire,” he stated.

John Dramani Mahama, the flagbearer of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), recently declared that if the NDC comes into office in 2025, it will revert the names of public universities to their original names.

Mahama accused the New Patriotic Party (NPP) government of merely renaming universities constructed by the NDC, emphasizing that the NPP had not established any new universities whiles in office.

During a two-day tour of the Upper East Region under the "Building Ghana Tour," the former president asserted that while administration blocks, hostels, and libraries could bear the names of individuals, the core names of public universities should reflect their original purpose.

“And so we will restore the original names, and the names that they have given them, will be given to a significant infrastructure in the Universities.

“We will add other people and name the infrastructure in the Universities after them. But if the University is University for Development Studies, that is its core mandate. It will be called the University for Development Studies,” he stated.



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