Corruption has made Ghana a 'cartel republic'– Franklin Cudjoe

President of policy think tank group IMANI Africa, Franklin Cudjoe, has stated the level of corruption in Ghana has propelled the country to become what he described as a “cartel republic”.

IMANI Africa has recently raised concerns about a Common Platform Revenue monitoring deal government signed with Kelni-GVG, insisting the deal is shady, needless and does not pass value for money test.

Speaking on 3FM’s Sunrise Monday Mr. Cudjoe observed that the Kelni-GVG contract is not an isolated case but there is a growing ulterior agenda by some Ghanaians to shortchange the country for their personal gains.

“There is an elite consensus out there to do the rest of us ill: the rest of us who are not in politics or probably not big business people”, he noted.

Franklin Cudjoe is worried that too many intelligent people in Ghana are swayed more towards their partisan political interests than they are towards the national interest and the wellbeing of the ordinary Ghanaian.

Making suggestive commentary about the adverse effects of the KelninGVG contract which is estimated to cost Ghana some $178 million, Franklin Cudjo said, “I felt pity for many of our kind who follow politicians, for want of a better word, sheepishly, and do not realise that when a $178 million [deal] is entered into which is an inflated one, it means that your village may not have a hospital bed and that ambulances may not be there”

He also suggested that it is as a result of such inflated contracts that have resulted in a situation where the Ghana Ambulance service is reported to have only 54 functional ambulances for the whole country, a situation he described as “genocidal”.

Commenting on the Anas’ latest investigative piece, #Number12, which exposed corruption in Ghana football and implicated the Ghana Football Association President, Kwesi Nyantakyi among others, Mr. Cudjoe said he was not surprised.

“When I saw the Nyantakyi video , I wasn’t particularly shocked, he was just trying to cream off only $50 million, that’s nothing compared with the bigger scandals we have had in the past when people have walked through the corridors of power and then made cool $35 million for being financial engineers.

“And today, the whole thing is growing, in fact we have grown from a contra republic to now a cartel republic and these are the things we want to see”, he said.

In his view, the culture of deliberately inflating government contracts and getting kickbacks is just as good as a contra-band economy where illicit goods and services are traded.

Meanwhile, Franklin has taken a swipe at critics who have accused IMANI of being bribed by Telcos to do their bidding by resisting the KelniGVG deal.

According to him if any telco finds the work of IMANI worth appreciating and they bring money he will collect.