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Opinions of Monday, 13 August 2018

Columnist: Michael Kweku Asante

Blaming Ibrahim Mahama for UT Bank's collapse is cheap propaganda

Ibrahim Mahama Ibrahim Mahama

Since when has it become wrong for business to take loans from a bank. It baffles many of us who view this government as one that will stand by its promise of supporting Enterprise.

Of course acquiring a loan to set up a business is certainly not a new thing in the business world. Many businesses all over the world thrive on it as it’s the order of business. It’s what creates wealth and value. Indeed bank loans are taken by many conglomerates around the world to expand business that employ thousands of workers and eventually find their way to Ghana to exploit our markets. The reason we are vulnerable is that we do not have equally strong local businesses.

It is no news that a business man like Ibrahim Mahama took a loan from a bank and built a cement factory that has the potential to transform the whole Ghanaian economy. Such are the kind of businesses that give shape and form to our economic development. Why anybody will bastardize this endeavor is a thing no sane economic analyst can understand.

Come to think of it, the Nigerian successful businessman Dangote who we applaud here everyday took mountains of loans to build his humongous business empire and which continues to help strengthen the Nigerian economy.

Mr. Ibrahim’s Dzata Cement is a national pride, a testimony that indeed a Ghanaian can own a business and be successful in the direction we can all be positively affected.

To say the least, the unsatisfying taste and quest to desperately smear him as being behind the collapse of UT Bank is malicious and unpatriotic.

The government should not appear to be winning political point from this just because it involves the brother of the former president. It’s about a Ghanaian businessman whose company will certainly solve the unemployment issues bedeviling the nation.

Ibrahim Mahama was not a director or a decision maker in any of the collapsed or collapsing banks.

And, oh, Ghanaians are not ignorant either.

Was it ok for an individual to take a loan to buy cars for all 275 constituencies but Ibrahim Mahama cannot take a loan to build a cement factory that will employ over 10,000 people.

If it was a Lebanese,Indian or any other foreigner who had borrowed to build the Dzata cement factory,government would have invited them for dinner at the presidency.

Instead of government supporting their own local business men to expand and create more employment opportunities for Ghanaians, look at the pull him down syndrome…If Bank of Ghana decides to close the banks, what has that got to do with Ibrahim Mahama?

Yeah, the great Aliko Dangote was Nana Addo’s VVIP guest at his inauguration and he owns a cement factory in Ghana: May be Nana should be curious enough to quiz Dangote how he did it so that a Ghanaian (Ibrahim) can replicate