Accra, March 6, GNA - The Convention People's Party (CPP), has appealed to the electorate to register in their numbers in the impending Voter Registration Exercise to enable them to vote the Party into power in Elections 2004.

The Party said it had subjected the economy of the country to a critical surgery and identified and isolated the main causes of its predicaments as well as outlined time-tested solutions that would restore it to a clean state of health and provide unlimited opportunities that would improve the quality of life of the people.

These were contained in a statement issued by the Party and signed by its Flag Bearer, Comrade George Aggudey to commemorate the 47th Anniversary of Ghana's independence.

The statement said it was regrettable to note that the country continued to grope in darkness in search of economic emancipation and social justice, even after 113 years of brutal colonial bondage and 47 years of political independence secured for the country by the CPP.

The statement further regretted that the light lit by the spiritual mentor and founder of the Party, Osagyefo Dr Kwame Nkrumah, of blessed memory, and which reactionaries and political opponents of the CPP put off, had resulted in the "endemic poverty and social deprivation that had engulfed the broad masses of the people."

It stated that the throwing overboard of the Nkrumaist prescriptions to solving the country's problems, had led to the "stagnation of the nation and the tightening of the debts noose to the point of strangulation".

The statement said that having gone through thorough soul-searching and political metamorphosis, the CPP "is once again poised to take over the mantle of political leadership in the country by winning the forthcoming Presidential and Parliamentary Elections."

It said if the CPP were voted into power, the party would ensure that the people produced enough to feed themselves and generated surplus for exports and debt repayment.

The statement expressed concern about the country's economy, which it said had suffered irreparably due to the suppression of her export products on the international commodity markets, resulting in low revenue receipts.

"This ugly development seem to have consigned the country to a permanent debtor nation which utilizes more than two-thirds of her foreign exchange earnings to service debts which keep on spiralling with the passage of development."

The statement pointed out that this ominous development "has led to even the present government taking the country to join the HIPC club with its attendant problems of more redundancies, galloping increases in electricity and water tariffs, and petroleum products and the divestiture of vital state assets."

While blaming the unemployment situation in the country on the inability of young graduates, especially at the tertiary level, to secure jobs on the labour market, the statement said health and educational workers continued to leave for foreign countries in search of greener pastures, due to poor remuneration and lack of incentives.

The statement said the CPP would provide unlimited opportunities that would improve the quality of life of Ghanaians, should the Party be given the mandate to rule the country.