Former President John Dramani Mahama has urged Ghanaians to show interest and actively participate in the political landscape of the country.

According to him, the current happening in the country is proof that Ghanaians must be concerned about the kind of people who take over the political leadership of the country.

The former president, who made these remarks during a presentation on the platform of the Chatham House Africa Programme, on Friday, January 27, 2022, posited that if Ghanaians do not take an active interest in politics, fools will continue to rule them.

“There is a price to pay for aloofness. There is a saying that those who refuse to participate in governance, the price they pay is to be ruled by fools.

“Today, there are bondholders who said ‘I don’t do politics, I am not NDC, I am not NPP', you see when the disaster come, today all of them have suddenly jumped up.

“If you had participated, we probably wouldn’t be where we are. So, everybody must take an interest in how the nation is run, and so nobody should be apolitical, because when the disaster comes, when the bus crashes, you are in that bus and the chances of you losing your life is higher probably more than the one driving,” he said.

The government of Ghana, on December 5, 2022, launched the Domestic Debt Exchange Programme, an invitation for the voluntary exchange of the government’s domestic notes and bonds for a package of new bonds.

The move is to help the government restructure GH¢137 billion of its domestic debts to prove to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that its debts are sustainable so that it can get the $3 billion bailout, it is seeking from the fund.

However, the government has had to extend the deadline for the programme due to opposition by individuals and entities who will be affected including individual bondholders as well as some labour unions.

Watch the former president’s remarks in the video below:



IB/SEA