Hot Race For Atiwa Seat

Posted: Daily Guide |www.dailyguideghana.com
Saturday, 28 August 2010
By Charles Takyi-Boadu
Reports from the Atiwa constituency in the Eastern region where the two major political parties in the country, the National Democratic Congress (NDC) and the New Patriotic Party (NPP), are battling for a vacant seat, indicate that the NDC is allegedly employing dubious means to win the seat.

The seat, considered a safe one for the NPP, became vacant following the death of the Member of Parliament, Kwasi Annor Ankamah last month.

Though other parties such as the People’s National Convention (PNC) and the New Vision Party are also vying for the seat, the NDC and NPP have started trading accusations as the campaign intensifies.

National Organizer of the NPP, Alhaji Moctar Bamba told DAILY GUIDE yesterday that agents of the NDC had begun intimidating members of the NPP in the area in order to rig the election.

“They are going round telling people that if they come out they will beat them at our strongholds. Now as I speak there are Azorka boys, the other people are all here, the BNI, the National Security are all here, working for the NDC,” he claimed.

He also alleged that the NDC is bringing fake voter identity cards from places like Akwatia to come and vote in Tuesday’s election.

According to him, they had intercepted about 45 of those fictitious voter identity cards which were going to be used by the NDC.

Bamba claimed that the NDC was doling out cash and other items including second-hand clothes (obroniwawu) to the constituents to influence the voting pattern.

These, he said, fed into a grand scheme employed by government and the NDC to prevent NPP members from voting.

However, the National Organizer of the NPP is optimistic that all these schemes would not yield anything since “we are putting everything in place so that ‘Insha Allah’ we can win the elections hands down.

“But all the same, we are resolute and we feel ‘Insha Allah’, in the name of Allah, we’re going to win hands down.”

Though the Atiwa seat is generally considered a safe one for the NPP, Alhaji Bamba said they would leave no stone unturned to retain the seat and also increase the votes.

Alhaji Bamba said he and other party bigwigs were with the party’s presidential candidate, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo campaigning vigorously and was therefore optimistic that the good people of Atiwa would give the NDC a good run for their money.

But National Organiser of the NDC Yaw Boateng-Gyan has denied the allegations being made by the NPP, saying “so far we haven’t seen any…negative incident.

“They should just come out and tell us one single person who has given out money to any of these people. We haven’t done anything like that,” he said.

He was surprised at the NPP’s claims since at the time of speaking to DAILY GUIDE, they had just come out of an Inter Party Advisory Committee (IPAC) meeting where all the parties had resolved to let the by-election be as peaceful as possible.

Mr. Boateng-Gyan says “if the people of Atiwa are development-oriented, then of course I don’t see why they will not vote for the NDC because there are lots of issues that they are raising in terms of them being neglected by the NPP when they know very well that it has been one of their strong holds.”

He said the constituents were complaining bitterly about how development projects had eluded them, considering the fact that Nana Addo’s mother hailed from the area.

The party, according to sources, was seen at Vanderpuye Village near Ayinam where they were distributing money and other materials.

Meanwhile, the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) has asked the various political parties contesting Tuesday’s Atiwa by-elections to exercise restraint in their actions and utterances.
It called on them to respect the 2008 political parties’ code of conduct which was prepared and signed by them.

A statement issued by the Executive Director of the IEA, Jean Mensa, also called on the voters and all Atiwa constituents to be law-abiding and ensure a peaceful by-election. She hoped this by-election would mark another success in Ghana’s democratic dispensation and electoral process.

The IEA said it trusted the independence of the country’s Electoral Commission (EC) and the capability and sense of professionalism of Ghana’s security agencies in ensuring an incident-free by-election, hoping that Ghana would eventually emerge the winner.

NDC Is Split

Posted: Daily Guide |www.dailyguideghana.com
Saturday, 28 August 2010
By Charles Takyi-Boadu
Kofi Adams, Deputy General Secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) who doubles as spokesman for the party’s founder, Jerry John Rawlings, has confirmed fears and speculations of political observers of the polarization of the ruling party.

According to Adams, the utterances of some individuals and groups in the party had led to the situation where they had been branded as belonging to either the Rawlings or Mills camp.

What bothers him most is the fact that those perceived as belonging to the Rawlings camp are often described as the ‘enemies within’, saying “I don’t think people who associate with the founder of the party are enemies of this government.”

Speaking on Accra-based X.FM yesterday, Kofi Adams did not understand why certain individuals and groups in the NDC misconstrued Mr. Rawlings as working against the party and the government which he so much toiled to bring to power.

He said “call any of our regional executive members, and if they will want to be truthful, that when they were running campaigns in terms of the presence of national leadership in their regions, if they were marking the amount of time spent campaigning, whether any national officer can match what the former president did.”

Some key and influential members of the NDC are not happy about Mr. Rawlings’s criticism of President Mills and the style of his administration but have not been courageous enough to say it in the open.

They believe his utterances would eventually affect the party, especially in the 2012 general elections, but his spokesman said those who haboured such weird perceptions about the former president must disabuse their minds and rather take his criticisms in good faith and make amends for the betterment of the NDC since he has no ill-intentions about the party.

Mr. Adams was responding to a question as to whether there was indeed seeping cracks and factionalism in the NDC as had been suggested in various circles.

He expressed gratitude to “the young men out there who still see and identify with the founder of the party and do not see themselves as enemies of the NDC.”

He stated that no political organization or institution including the NDC could do without factionalism. He therefore called on members of the party, especially those in influential positions, to embrace dissenting views to strengthen the party.

“These factions can be used positively; they must not be used to destroy the organization,” he said, noting that such perceptions contributed to the downfall of the party.

Frustrations Of Ghanaian Businessmen

Posted: Daily Guide | www.dailyguideghana.com
Friday, 27 August 2010
By Charles Takyi-Boadu
The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Kama Group of Companies, Dr Michael Agyekum Addo has summed up the frustrations of Ghanaian businessmen.

Dr Addo noted that though several reasons have been assigned to the ‘poor’ performance of Ghanaian businesses and their products on the local and international markets, there is more to it than the usual reasons, which includes issues about funds, transport, natural resources.

He disclosed this at a round-table discussion organized by the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) that was aimed at exploring ways ‘towards a national agenda to ensure consistency in government policy for the private sector.”

The purpose of the forum was to provide a platform to discuss how to kick-start a policy framework geared towards private sector development in Ghana.

Whilst he appreciates the efforts of successive governments to support local businesses with initiatives such as the Export Development Fund (EDIF), the accomplished businessman said they have not done enough to protect them against the unhealthy trade practices and competition from their foreign counterparts, adding that most of their products have been subsidized by their respective governments.

It has been argued that successive governments have not done a good job in creating and running productive enterprises to create employment and incomes for the citizenry- a role that the private sector has assumed.

Though the private sector is considered as the engine of growth of the Ghanaian economy, Dr Addo indicated that most of the facilities that government extend to local manufacturers, who import machines and raw materials into the country for production, are nothing but mere niceties which only look good to the eyes but in reality are extremely difficult to access.

For the offers that come from the Free Zones Board (FZB), he said the little said about it the better since the processes a company has to go through in order to access it serves as a deterrent, stressing that it takes between five to seven months for companies to get their refund after going through strenuous processes.

“What kind of policy is this?” he asked rhetorically. “It has to be modified such that the refund would be fast enough to make the zero rating meaningful.”

He stressed that until government creates the necessary environment for effective implementation of sound policies the claim that the private sector is the engine of growth would be nothing but a mere lip service and mirage.

The practical nature of his submissions attracted intermittent applause from the high-profile personalities including industry players and members of the academia who graced the occasion.

In the pharmaceutical industry where he is a key player, he narrated the tortuous ordeal that they go through to obtain reimbursement from the country’s National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS), stressing that the funds delay for up to six months.

He believes these and other poor policies of government stifle local businesses and stressed the need for government to revise them, since according to him, they were killing local businesses.

He said even though several attempts have been made by successive governments to strengthen and develop the private sector, most of them have been on ad hoc basis and achieved very little results.

The CEO of the Kama Group of Companies, who sounded emotional about the situation, also talked about the stringent conditions that are attached to loan facilities extended to local businesses by foreign institutions such as the Global Fund.

“It is like a fence with dogs at the gate, you cannot enter.”

On the issue of the Global Fund, he said before one could put in a tender for its products, the company must be World Health Organisation (WHO) pre-qualified.

They are so high that in the whole of Africa, there are only three facilities that are WHO pre-qualified with Ghana not an exception, he said.

Meanwhile, the local Food and Drugs Board (FDB) and the Ghana Standards Board (GSB) are all certified institutions which operate under the terms and conditions of the WHO.

According to him, medicines and products that are produced in Ghana have been tested and proven to have the same curative functions as those imported.

“Why is it that medicine that is being supported by the Global Fund cannot be tested locally?”

Interestingly, he said when these international organizations run short of products, they turn to the local companies for refuge- an indication that their products by all standards qualify for the world market.

He called on government to make policies that would inure to the benefit of local companies and set up an industrial fund like the GETFUND to assist indigenous companies.

He stressed the need for government to assign commercial attachés to the country’s foreign missions to promote the private sector in Ghana and urged Ghanaians to cultivate the habit of patronizing made in Ghana goods to help grow the economy and set standards for companies.

A Senior Fellow of the IEA, Dr Kwadwo Tutu believes that Ghana as a country cannot attain the middle income status by the year 2020 unless adequate steps are taken to reform the private sector to enable it play an role effective.