Accra, April 21, GNA - The Committee for Joint Action (CJA) on Tuesday urged government to pursue pragmatic measures in the 2008 Manifesto of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) to ensure economic empowerment for Ghanaians.

It said the seeming lack of change in the direction of policies was not encouraging and could not address the spiralling cost of living. A statement read by Mr Bernard Mornah, Member of the CJA, at a press conference in Accra, said Ghanaians voted for change and expected that there would be change in the status quo to a more human-centred approach to addressing the hardships facing them. It said the conventional approach that had been adopted over the years to address the country's economic underdevelopment had proved to be unreliable and there was the need to undertake a complete overhaul of the country's economic policy focus.

The CJA said the practice of passing on the cost of crude oil prices to consumers anytime it went up on the international market was not sustainable and urged government to resort to hedging to alleviate the plight of Ghanaians.

Touching on water, it said the government must urgently implement measures to address the water crisis that had bedevilled the country adding that it must not only be made available but also affordable. It said government must do away with the policy of disposing the country's strategic assets whenever it was in some financial difficulty adding that such policies had not yielded dividend.

It called on the legislature and the judiciary to independently discharge their duties to restore their image in the eyes of Ghanaians. The CJA said it had uncovered corruption and mismanagement of state funds within the previous administration and called on government to review all dubious agreements and bring to justice those who might have been implicated in such acts.