Government has challenged former President John Dramani Mahama to provide evidence to back his claims in which he accuses the presidency of mismanaging covid 19 funds by using them to finance 2020 polls.
The defeated flagbearer of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) in the 2020 elections has alleged that President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo diverted funds meant for COVID-19 into his campaign.
According to him, some GH¢33 billion which was supposed to be used to combat COVID-19 ended up in the campaign by the New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the President.
The former President made these allegations during the 24th African Business Conference organised by the Harvard Business School.
During his keynote address, John Mahama acknowledged the efforts of countries that are successfully returning to a good footing through fiscal discipline and judicious application of their resources during the crisis.
But the situation in Ghana is not a good example worth trumpeting, according to the 2020 NDC flagbearer.
“Ghana’s fate was easy to predict with the cavalier handling of the economy by the current administration. We went into the pandemic without adequate buffers, and have emerged with a terribly battered economy,” he said.
“To make matters worse, the pandemic windfall of over GH¢33 billion which could have cushioned the economy remains unaudited and is believed to have been used largely in the quest to win the 2020 elections at all cost,” Mr Mahama told the gathering.
“Before the pandemic, poverty reduction was already a major challenge. The pandemic is estimated to have dragged about 55 million more people into poverty in Africa and exposed another 46 million more to the risk of hunger, and malnourishment. Indeed 70% of hunger in Africa, which had already been on the rise since 2014 is directly attributable to this pandemic.”
However, responding to the allegations by Mr. Mahama, Presidential Advisor on Health, Dr. Nsiah Asare debunked the allegations before saying that “For someone as a former President who has been a Head of State before to say this at an international forum, for me it is something that need to be condemned.
“I believe it was rather the time for him to let the world know what Ghana has done as far COVID 19 is concerned but not to speculate. I’ll call it speculation because i don’t know where the figures that he is talking about came from.
“Secondly, I am not sure of the funds he is talking about that it was used for elections 2020. If you remember, that was the time we even needed funds most for the people of the country. I am very surprise that such a statement is coming from him. I don’t know where he is getting his figures from and I don’t know who he contacted to get those figures. I don’t know which document he used. But I am sure the Ministry of Finance will come out to tell Ghanaians and the whole world what we used the money for.
“I know we had some funds from World Bank which came through and he knows as a former head of state the system that we go through.”
By Vincent Kubi