Strong men needed for strong institutions - Pelpuo

Incorruptible strong men are needed to occupy strong institutions in Ghana to ensure that those institutions work well, Abdul-Rashid Pelpuo, Minister of State (Public-Private-Partnerships), has said.

Although there is a school of thought that Africa does not need strong men but strong institutions, a theory propounded by US President Barack Obama when he visited Ghana in 2009, Mr Pelpuo believes the time has come for strong men to man the top positions in strong institutions to perform their duties without fear or favour.

Speaking on the Executive Breakfast Show (EBS) on Class91.3 FM hosted by Prince Minkah on Wednesday June 1, in connection with the first anniversary of the June 3 twin disaster (flood and explosion which killed about 150 people at the Kwame Nkrumah Circle), Mr Pelpuo put the incident down to the failure of institutions at enforcing the laws.

Mr Pelpuo noted: “It was a misfortune for the rest of the country to have more than 150 of our compatriots losing their lives for no fault of theirs out of our collective failure to handle our sanitation properly and to ensure that there are enough drainages in the country, which has been an accumulated non-action of many people over the years from independence.”

He told host Prince Minkah: “We need strong men, not just strong institutions. If we have strong institutions and we don’t have strong men to ensure that the institutions are run properly, you will have a problem.

“You put a human being in a particular situation and that situation demands an action. If he doesn’t act that way, then the institutions become useless, so we will need people who are committed to enforcing the laws, we need people who are committed to ensuring that the institutions are workable and we need people who are patriotic enough not to allow themselves to be corrupted by the individuals who they deal with every day,” he indicated.

Mr Pelpuo, who is also the Member of Parliament for Wa Central, recognised that there was a decay in the Ghanaian system, and that Ghana needed people who would rise above the rot to ensure the right things were done.

“…We need somebody who should rise above the decay of our society so those are the people we need,” he emphasised, adding: "Go to Facebook and see the things people write. They virtually insult our elders, that is the kind of society we have," he lamented.