The Deputy Minister of Information, Pius Hadzide, has accused the Minority in Parliament of unnecessarily maligning the government’s fight against the novel coronavirus pandemic.
Speaking on Eyewitness News, Mr. Hadzide said there was no basis for the Minority’s complaints.
Hadzide made the comments on the backdrop of a press conference organised by the Minority on Thursday.
The Minority at the event claimed that the government was manipulating data on the virus’ spread in Ghana amongst others.
The Minority also called on the government to be more transparent with its data.
But Mr. Hadzide chided the Minority for not directing the queries to the appropriate institutions.
“In the case that institutions and persons want to interrogate the data and find some information, they could properly approach the relevant authorities; in this case the Ghana Health Service, the testing centres, Noguchi that is coordinating the testing, and all that. But to go out in the manner and fashion that the NDC did suggests to me that they just want to find fault even when there is none and to create a gloomy picture of Ghana’s fight.”
Mr. Hadzide further noted that “Ghana has been touted to be the country to be testing the most per capita and that should count for something.”
One of the Minority’s concerns was that on two separate occasions in April, the number of confirmed cases under routine surveillance was revised downwards without any explanation whatsoever.
In response to this, Mr. Hadzide suggested that the Minority may have been responding to a typo from the Ghana Health Service.
“If it is those typographical errors that the NDC prefers to dwell on to create the gloomy picture they are creating, maybe they will be in a better position to explain but I am not sure what it is they are talking about.”