The spin doctors have expectedly set out to work. The task of these apostles of impossibilities is to douse the “harmattan” fire lit by the Vice President Dr. Alhaji Mahamudu Bawumia at a lecture in Accra last Wednesday.
These ‘can never innovate apostles’ mostly in the opposition NDC, some media houses, academia and civil society have concluded that the Vice President has nothing new to offer.
What these apostles of doom have always held against Dr. Bawumia is that he has been part of the Akufo-Addo government that has been battling the economic malaise for a while.
For people who are to know better that any person in advisory role functions as such and the advice is not binding, in the case of Dr. Bawumia as Chairman of the Economic Management Team (EMT), they lay all our economic woes at the doorstep of the Vice President.
Even John Mahama who once served as such thinks his contender in the upcoming general election must answer why the Akufo-Addo government took the country to the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
Surely Ghanaians have short memories and that is why Ghanaians are not putting similar questions to him when his “master” Professor Mills promised one time premium payment for health insurance and the aborted XTL housing project that was launched with fanfare.
We do not need any tutorials in our body politic because the day the opposition NDC would acknowledge the good works of the NPP government, the world would come to an end. Already, the leader of the NDC’s propaganda brigade, Johnson Asiedu Nketia claims the far-reaching agenda of Dr. Bawumia is a carbon copy of what his candidate John Mahama has put out before the people.
From where we sit, can Asiedu Nketia tell Ghanaians what exactly John Mahama intends to do for Ghana if he is elected President? His main mantra, the 24-hour economy, is understood by only a few of his megaphones in the media and academia, who appear more confused about the concept than the person who mooted it. Again, how can the NDC downplay the effects of digitalisation in the economy while propagating a 24-hour economy?
Has the NDC thought of how our compatriots in the remotest parts of the country effectively participate in the 24-hour economy without the role of the digital platform?
Will the Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) be part of John Mahama’s 24-hour economy and how? The debate that the Vice President’s lecture at the UPSA last Wednesday has ignited only indicates how intense the campaign between the NPP and the NDC would be.
Of particular interest to the people would be the polemics between Vice President Bawumia and former President Mahama. Last Wednesday, the Vice President did not distance himself from the gains and failures of the Akufo-Addo government. He only stated the obvious that by the mandate of the Fourth Republican Constitution, the Vice President has very little beyond offering advice to be accused to have failed.
However, Dr. Bawumia stated in very clear terms the policies he initiated that impacted greatly the lives of the people.
He therefore invited his main contender, John Mahama, to tell Ghanaians what he did while he was Vice President under the late President Mills.
We are told the late President Mills was so scandalised by some actions of his Vice President that he set up a committee to look into the matter.