Akufo-Addo still thinks he is a Foreign Minister – Mettle Nunoo

Campaign Manager for the late President John Evans Atta-Mills; Rojo Mettle Nunoo has questioned the rationale behind the President’s numerous foreign trips since his assumption of official duties. According to him, the President is acting as though he still were occupying the position of a Foreign Minister.

Speaking in an interview with JoyNews, Mr. Mettle Nunoo indicated that the trips are unnecessary except in instances where there are other heads of states involved and it’s essential for the President to be present. Rather he says, the Foreign Minister who has been appointed by the office of the President to handle such tasks should be in a position to do exactly that whenever the situation arises.

“I think the President is still thinking he is a Foreign Minister. There are a lot of trips that he has undertaken so far that I think the Foreign Minister should have undertaken. Where there are platforms for heads of states, I don’t have a problem with him attending those…”, he stated.

Mr. Nunoo maintained that there are several governance issues facing the country that have been unresolved and he finds it puzzling that the President would rather focus on taking trips that could be handled by an equally capable person than focus on resolving the issues facing the country.

“I think to a very large extent, the governance challenges of the first six months have not been sufficiently addressed. Many boards and councils are not in place, if these are very strategic institutions of government, it’s totally unacceptable that the universities, the polytechnics and several other institutions don’t have their boards and councils in place and yet they are expected to take fundamental decisions of governance”, he maintained.

Speaking on the performance of the New Patriotic Party since it took over power, Mettle Nunoo stated that he had no expectations from the government and hence cannot be judgmental. He however indicated that he would have been disappointed if he had expectations of this new government adding that he believes the NPP has nothing different to offer.
“I have no expectations of the NPP, so I can only see it unfold and then I’ll comment. If I had expectations of the NPP, I’d be disappointed but I don’t believe that anything different will happen”.

President Nana Addo has visited many countries in the sub-region since he took over the helm of affairs.
In the past few months, he has paid working visits to Sierra Leone, Togo, Liberia, Mali and recently Liberia and Mali. Some have argued that these travels are unnecessary because they have not yielded positive results for Ghana.

President Akufo-Addo previously served as Minister for Foreign Affairs from 2003 to 2007 under the erstwhile Kufour administration.