‘Governance not about empty sloganeering and PR stunts’ – Mahama to NPP

Former President John Dramani Mahama has taken aim at the ruling New Patriotic Party saying “the problems facing our country and the solutions to them cannot be reduced to a handful of fancy slogans and poorly conceived and implemented half-measures aimed at obtaining short-lived political gratification.”

Mr. Mahama who was speaking at an economic forum organised by the NDC in Accra said governance is not about sloganeering and PR stunts.

“Governance is not about empty sloganeering and PR stunts. It should be about methodical steps that are well-conceived and thought through to address our problems holistically and permanently. It should be about crafting and rolling out a vision that transforms society in meaningful ways with clearly benefit all our people.

“The seemingly intractable problems we face and the vicious cycle they continue to perpetuate should compel us to create room for more consultation and deliberation among competing political forces and ideologies as we demonstrated when we convened the Senchi economic forum leading to the formulation of Senchi Consensus,” he said.

He stressed: “Sitting with political opponents to find common ground and thinking through national problems is not an admission of defeat nor helplessness. It is a demonstration of maturity and statesmanship, oozing out of a shared desire to see our nation progress irrespective of the colour of those who govern at a particular point in time.”

Mr. Mahama said the government has plunged the country into an economic crisis.

“COVID19 only became a pretext for reckless election-related spending, which produced the largest-ever budget deficit in the recent economic history of Ghana last year. Our debt has ballooned to unsustainable levels – topping 80% of GDP – exposing us to very high risk of debt default.”