Policy think tank, IMANI Africa, says the next government must bear the responsibility of addressing procurement leakages within the public sector.
Ghana is set to go to the polls on December 7, 2024, to elect a new president and parliamentarians.
Analysts project a keen contest between former president John Dramani Mahama and Vice President Dr. Mahamudu, both of whom have experienced the Jubilee House.
The think tank explains that the current economic challenges can be partially resolved if the next government makes deliberate efforts to streamline its expenditure and remains committed to building a better nation.
Speaking on The Big Issue on Citi TV, Franklin Cudjoe, President of IMANI Africa, emphasized that irrespective of the party that wins, more work awaits the next government.
“Whoever wins the presidency would have to deal with the fact that for the next four years, we are in a serious economic programme whose honest survival would depend on how the government behaves. And how the government behaves is a function of how many people are appointed into office and the calibre of persons appointed to office. We don’t have to have a conversation about how a potential Bawumia or potential Mahama government would continue the habit of what I call highly infected cluelessness.”
“And it is important we do them. By the way, these things are not new, and we can say that to develop this country doesn’t take much. I am struggling to understand why it is so difficult to do and difficult in government because when politicians take charge, they want to apprise everybody, and so they divide the entire resources of the country into bits and pieces. Not necessarily following, the bits and pieces eventually result in 70% or 80% being procured wrongly and ending up in their pockets. I think these are matters we need to deal with, and whoever promises to do this pragmatically, honestly, and indeed through meritocracy would definitely be giving the Ghanaian a very good ground for his money.”
