Former President John Dramani Mahama
Former President John Dramani Mahama, the flagbearer of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC), has appealed to the electorate to vote the party back to power for sustainable growth and prosperity for all.
The party finally launched its manifesto yesterday after a series of postponements with a promise, among other things, of a $10 billion infrastructure plan it has termed the Big Push.
The manifesto captured all sectors of the economy and brought some social intervention policies which members of the party say will transform the country better than what their opponents are doing currently.
The NDC was booted out of power about four years ago for its poor handling of the economy but members of the party are saying that this time around they intend to roll out an aggressive job and entrepreneurial programme in the public and private sectors that will deliver a minimum of 250,000 jobs every year.
The flagbearer of the party has promised a total of 1,000,000 jobs across the country by the end of his term in office in 2024, claiming his administration will put Ghanaians to work to earn a decent living.
“The involvement of women in the decision-making process will not end at the level of Vice-President. We will work towards the attainment of a minimum of 30% of all appointments going to women.
“We will implement a set of robust health policies and plans aimed at aggressively tackling and reducing maternal mortality by half from the current 319 per 100,000 live births,” he said.
“We shall ensure female socio-economic empowerment, enact the Spousal Rights Law, establish exclusive and secured shelters for abused women and children, and provide opportunities for all. As a Social Democratic Party, we seek to harness the best qualities in all our people to transform the destiny of our nation (sic),” he said, adding “in that direction, and as the fulcrum around which our Health Policy will evolve, we will before the end of 2021, introduce and begin the implementation of a Free Primary Health Care Plan. This will make the provision of primary health care to all Ghanaians, young and elderly, FREE. Our free health care plan will guarantee a healthy people and provide a healthy workforce needed to accelerate our development (sic).”
The NDC which created the financial crisis is promising through Mr. Mahama that “we shall pay within one year all who have funds locked up with the collapsed financial institutions within one year. I promise! We shall not put up any long-term payment plans that will further worsen the living conditions of the victims.”
They said the next NDC administration would establish a financial services authority that will be responsible for ensuring that consumer financial markets work for consumers, providers and the economy as a whole. The authority would oversee all financial products and services that are offered to consumers, and would effectively and efficiently prevent and stop the challenges that have confronted customers of Menzgold, DKM, among others.
“We will send all contractors with valid contracts who have been sitting at home for four years without being paid for legitimate work done for the government back to site. We will make immediate arrangements to pay them their hard-earned monies deliberately withheld by the Nana Addo administration due to politics,” Mr. Mahama promised, adding “we will build a peaceful, secure and strong economy that provides sustainable jobs through a transformed, industrialized and digital economy.”
“We will reinforce the independence of state institutions such as the Electoral Commission, Auditor General’s Department, EOCO and CHRAJ, adding that single sourced procurement – sole sourcing – will be an exception, not the rule” even though almost everything under his tenure was sole-sourced.
“In pursuance of social justice, I will vigorously push through a constitutional review that creates a fairer and just emoluments system and removes the distortions between Article 71 office-holders and other public sector employees,” Mr. Mahama said, adding “we will as part of an Integrity for Development action plan, launch ‘Operation Sting’.”
“Operation Sting is an anti-corruption crusade, which under my watch will involve massive, far-reaching and practical governmental reforms. It will be ruthless against all corrupt political appointees and public sector workers,” he said.
“Of course, the elephantine-size government of 125 ministers we have been burdened with for four years will be reduced drastically. The savings made from emoluments of reduced number of ministers and the privileges they enjoy will be channeled towards paying Assembly Members to perform the function of collecting accurate births and deaths information in their various electoral areas (sic),” he added.
By Ernest Kofi Adu