Accra, May 22, GNA - The Ghana Trades Union Congress (GTUC) on Thursday called on presidential candidates of the various political parties to make clear their visions for the future development of the country to the electorate. Speaking at the launch of Agenda 2012, which seeks to make election campaigns issue-based, Mr. Kofi Asamoah, Acting Secretary-General of GTUC, said it was important that presidential candidates debated on concrete policy issues that had the capacity to transform the nation's economy and lift workers out of the quagmire of mass poverty into the middle income status.

According to him the approach of politics of insults and personality attacks must change because it deprived the electorate of the opportunity to discuss and demand answers from the potential rulers on how best to fix the monumental challenges that faced them. "This process is all that the Agenda 2012 is all about, to ensure that electioneering campaigns are not centred on personality attacks while relegating the important national issues to the background," he said.

Mr Asamoah said democracy was not all about having free and fair elections but must be rewarded with benefits to help the electorate on whose behalf the government administered the country. "This is why the TUC has intended to make this year's elections an issue-based one and not one of casting of insinuations," he said. Mr Asamoah said the electorate expected the government of the day to fulfil their promises of providing decent employment that delivered living wages, access to potable water, quality health delivery and access to improved and quality education.

Ms Kathrin Meissner, Resident Director, Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, said democracy could only work effectively if political parties constantly visited electorate to get first hand information of their main problems and saw how best to address such challenges. She reiterated the need for political parties seeking power to disclose to voters what they stood to gain and through which policies. Dr Audrey Gadzekpo, Acting Head of the School of Communication Studies, University of Ghana, Legon, called on the media to set the agenda by scrutinizing the manifesto of the presidential candidates of the various political parties for the electorate to be enlightened on their programmes and policies.

She said the time had come for the media to hold governments in power responsible based on their promises to electorate since the manifestos they presented in seeking elections were part of a social contract. The Agenda 2012, a collaborative effort of Friedrich Ebert Stiftung (FES), the GTUC, the Ghana Journalists Association and Abantu for Development, aims to promote interaction and debate of programmes of the various political parties. 22 May 08