Nana Addo Hits Back

Posted: Daily Guide |Thursday, 29 April 2010

A KNEE-JERK reaction put out by the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) propaganda machinery to smother some facts and figures stated by the 2008 Presidential Candidate of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, about the economy of Ghana, has caught fire.

Days after Nana Addo launched his 2010 Presidential bid, at which he indicated that 39.5percent Ghanaians lived below the poverty line in 1999, a year before the NDC (1) lost power to the NPP, the NDC, through its propaganda machinery led by party Propaganda Secretary, Richard Quashigah, came out to deny Nana Addo’s claim, saying he was being insincere with the facts about the NDCs performance in office.

This, according to the NDC, was because the figures put out by the then Government Statistician, Dr. Kweku A. Twum-Baah, in the year 2000, gave the percentage of Ghanaians living below the poverty line as 28% based on the Ghana Living Standard Survey Three (GLSS 3).

When the party’s Propaganda Secretary was challenged with confirmation of the facts as presented by Nana Akufo-Addo on Citi FM’s Eye Witness News ,Tuesday evening, he could not defend the party’s position, except to beat a hasty retreat that he was going to ‘cross-check’ the very facts he used to accuse Nana Akufo-Addo of being insincere.

In a quick and swift rebuttal, Nana Addo has noted with emphasis that it would be extremely disingenuous on the part of the NDC as a party and a government, to misrepresent the statistics as reported by the then Acting Government Statistician.

A statement issued by Mustapha Hamid, head of Nana Addo’s communications team, indicated that “Dr Twum-Baah on Monday, October 30, 2000, launched ‘The Poverty Report’, which was published together with the fourth in the series of Ghana Living Standards Survey (GLSS4). What he stated correctly, without using the previous GLSS3 of 1992 as baseline, was that ‘the incidence of poverty at the upper line declined from 51.7 percent in 1991-1992, to 39.5 percent in 1998-1999’.”

In some apparent state of statistical discomfiture and confusion, the statement said Richard Quashigah explained that the GLSS3 report put the number of people in Ghana living under the poverty line at 28 percent.

Nana Addo therefore noted that “the NDC, which was in office at the time, could not have been ignorant of the fact that the third Ghana Living Standards Survey (GLSS3) referred to the period September 1991 – September 1992, and the report was published in March 1995, when Daasebre Dr Oti Boateng was Government Statistician and GLSS Project Co-ordinator.”

That report, as pointed by Nana Addo, the statement said, put the percentage number of Ghanaians living below the poverty line of $1 per day at 51.7 percent; stating that “the NDC should be content with taking credit for reducing the percentage from 51.7 percent to 39.5 percent in 1999 and stop making false claims of 28percent.”

“That 28 percent incidence of poverty claim for 1999, is typical of a party that is not ashamed of making propaganda claims out of important statistics, such as the previous claim of creating 1.6 million new phantom jobs since January 2009,” stated Nana Addo.

In this regard, Mustapha Hamid said the NDC statement should have rather accused Nana Addo of being too modest in trumpeting the unprecedented real increases that Ghanaian workers experienced in their purchasing power, under President J A Kufuor.

Instead, he noted that typical of their propaganda status, the NDC has issued a statement saying, “Besides it is mischievous and misleading on the part of Nana Addo to state that the number of Ghanaians currently living below the poverty line has increased by 500,000 persons, a figure he attributed to the World Bank.

This is untrue because the World Bank, which he sourced his information from, is yet to release any figures for 2009, more so for the year 2010.”

This, he said, was because, Nana Addo stated that “but, as a result of the economic policies adopted by President Mills and his government, the World Bank is now estimating that half a million more Ghanaians will fall below the poverty line by this year alone.”
He therefore noted that the statement by the NDC Propaganda Secretary, “Only goes to expose the weight of panic Nana Akufo-Addo is capable of sending across the nerve centre of the NDC.”

Mills Driver Dodges

Posted:Daily Guide |Thursday, 29 April 2010

By Charles Takyi-Boadu
There seems to be a deliberate attempt to cover up the shooting of a 44-year-old innocent civil servant, Daniel Nii Okai Adams, by one of the drivers of President John Evans Atta Mills.

On Friday April 23, 2010, William Nii Adu Doku, who works at the seat of government, the Osu Castle, and lives in an area called ‘Nii We’ near Castle, shot Daniel when the latter went to fetch water in his (Nii Adu’s) house.

Daniel, who is currently on admission at the Trust Hospital in Osu, narrated to DAILY GUIDE that just when he was fetching the water around 7:30am, he felt something pierce his back, only to realize that he had been hit by a bullet. There and then, he fell to the ground and was rushed to the hospital.

Asked what exactly led to the incident, Daniel, who was finding it difficult to sit up due to the agony he was in, said Nii Adu, his assailant, told him it was an accidental discharge, and that he was cleaning the pistol when he unfortunately pulled the trigger.

Daniel had since been operated on, but unable to walk.

According to family sources, doctors said two of the nerves in Daniel’s spinal cord were hit by the bullet, thereby making it extremely difficult for him to walk.

It was however not clear whether Nii Adu, who used to drive the then Candidate Mills and his wife Ernestina Naadu throughout the 2008 electioneering campaign, had been given any form of training in handling arms and ammunitions since he was only known to be a driver.

On Tuesday, some Castle officials were said to have visited the victim at the hospital.

Meanwhile, the assailant has not reported the incident to the police and is walking a free man and still wielding the deadly weapon.

It took the authorities of the Trust Hospital to lodge a formal complaint at the Osu Police Station three clear days after the incident, since according to Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) Mabel Aterh, the Osu District Police Commander and Chief Inspector Emmanuel Klutse, the investigator handling the case, Nii Adu had not shown up.

The Osu District Commander was not forthcoming with information when she was reached on phone because “it was too early and the issue is still being investigated”.

When DAILY GUIDE told her that information suggested that the suspect works at the Castle, ASP Aterh denied knowledge.

Though this paper managed after strenuous efforts to reach Nii Adu on his cell phone, he immediately hanged up when he heard the phone call was from DAILY GUIDE.

He has since refused to answer his phone calls to react to the incident.

Prosecute Muntaka - NPP Yells

Posted: Daily Guide | Wednesday, April 28, 2010

The opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) is seething with anger over government’s decision to interdict the two prime witnesses and civil servants who blew the cover of former Youth and Sports Minister Alhaji Mohammed Muntaka Mubarak.

The NPP therefore called for the prosecution of Alhaji Muntaka Mubarak who is currently walking a free man, since the provisions of the country’s Constitution does not encourage justice for a select few, but for all persons.

The two civil servants, Albert Anthony Ampong and Adim Odoom, Chief Director of the Ministry of Youth and Sports and Principal Accountant of the same ministry respectively, were interdicted on the instructions of President John Evans Atta Mills, when they made startling revelations about financial malpractices at the Ministry, which led to the eventual removal of Muntaka.

Reminiscent of the dark days of the Rawlings-led Provisional National Defence Council (PNDC) era, government proceeded to seize the official vehicles of the two senior civil servants through the use of 14 National Security operatives, smacking of executive influence.

A statement issued and signed by the Communications Director of the NPP, Kwaku Kwarteng yesterday, said “the attitude of the NDC government in this matter makes complete nonsense of their professed fight against corruption, considering the biased nature they have treated the two civil servants and rather let the Minister off the hook”.

The party contended that the two court rulings in favour of the two victims are “a loud statement about the NDC government’s penchant for acting unlawfully and recklessly”.

The NPP therefore called for the immediate re-instatement of the two senior civil servants, since the party believed the interdiction of the two is without any reason and rather a knee-jerk reaction to their success in the court action they instituted against government and for that matter, the Attorney-General.

For the NPP as a party, what is most worrying is the effect of the interdiction of the two poor civil servants on the professional integrity of the Civil Service, since it believes that the Civil Service as an institution is an indispensable tool for the nation's development, and nothing should be done to undermine its professional integrity.

“It is expected that when poor civil servants are compelled to institute a legal action in defence of their rights, they will not be victimized as a result,” Mr Kwarteng said, reminding Ghanaians of the provisions of Article 191 of the Constitution which protects civil servants from victimization and unjust punishment.

In all of this, the NPP said the role of the Attorney-General's Department cannot go without reprobation, and observed the department is gradually turning out to be “the worst nightmare of the Mills Presidency”.

In an issue like this, when the Attorney-General has been notified of the attempt to interdict the two civil servants and the letter interdicting them has been copied to her, it is expected that the Attorney-General would advise the Civil Service Council on the illegality of its actions.

On the contrary, the NPP noted that the Attorney-General has remained silent on this brute violation of the rights of two innocent and ‘poor’ Ghanaian workers, noting with emphasis that “all this is a wicked and embarrassing display of selective justice”.

Meanwhile, the former Minister, Alhaji Muntaka Mubarak has only been asked to ‘go and sin no more’ whilst the two civil servants who dared to draw attention to the looting of the taxpayer’s money have been interdicted.

In the light of this, the NPP asked rhetorically: “What kind of ‘father-for-all’ is President Mills?”

The party said this action will deter public servants and the public in general from volunteering information towards the fight against corruption.

The National Security Committee, which investigated the infamous ‘Muntaka Saga’, made express findings of financial impropriety and misconduct against him, which among others included collecting per diems from the Ministry when he was not entitled to; falsely representing a lady as an official of the Ministry of Youth and Sports for the purposes of securing visa when the lady was in fact NOT an official of the Ministry; and wasting the taxpayer's money on the same lady’s visit to Germany, as part of a government entourage.

Aside that, he was also found to have wasted the taxpayer's money on the lady again on a trip to Ivory Coast to watch a football tournament as part of a government delegation and wasting the taxpayer's money on baby oil, baby diapers, baby food, meat for his household and so on, when those personal items are not supposed to be part of the budget for the Ministry of Youth and Sports.

In the face of these gloomy findings against the Minister, President Mills asked media men who were seeking answers as to what sanctions were being taken against Muntaka whether that was the first time a Minister had travelled abroad with a girlfriend, saying that it was an act of indiscretion. “One would have expected the President and his Attorney-General to recommend the prosecution of Alhaji Muntaka.

On the contrary, the President, in a twist of contradictions, heaped praises on Muntaka and merely asked for a refund of the expenses he falsely charged on the budget of the Ministry of Youth and Sports,” the NPP