Akua Bonsu

When we were young, there was a saying about deceptive people that when they ask you to look up, look down for your own good. These days, that saying befits no one or no entity more than the National Destruction Congress (NDC). Just about every statement it issues is anything but the truth. Ghanaians are thus warned to verify, examine, investigate, or research for themselves before they accept what this government says. Our collective gullibility must end lest we wake up one morning to a country sold.

The government issued a statement that as a result of its austerity measures, it has saved for Ghanaians an amount of 8 million Ghana Cedis. Just as we all began to clap for the achievement, it turns out the statement is yet another lie from the government. The 2009 budget statement from this same government had government expenditure on administration, services and wages totaling 2.6 billion Ghana Cedis. The following 2010 budget has expenditure on that same area totaling 2.92 billion Ghana Cedis. One of two things happened here; either this government is clearly misrepresenting the truth which it does habitually, or the ineptitude that has characterized everything they do had someone subtracting 2.6 billion from 2.92 billion, and declaring the result as a savings rather than an increase in expenditure.

Remember that this 7.6% INCREASE in expenditure came amidst a government freeze on employment, something contrary to Mills’ campaign promise of creating jobs, and a much touted set of austerity measures. We know this government has not been able to create one single job; if there has been any new hiring, they are merely jobs taken from perceived NPP sympathizers and given to their NDC counterparts. But the set of austerity measures is one of the biggest hoaxes we have ever experienced in our young, half-century history as a nation.

More examples will follow when we have more information. But one such example of jaw-dropping waste of national resources came on a trip to commission the FPSO, the super tanker that will lift the oil from the Jubilee Field. This commissioning was done on a foreign land – in Singapore to be precise. Traditionally, the appropriate personalities warranted to be there would be officials in the energy sector such as the Energy Minister, the Chairman and ranking member of Parliamentary Committee on energy, a GNPC representative, and a few others.

So explain how Ghana sent 40, count them, 40 people to Singapore. What is more, this contingent included a so-called chief, his umbrella bearer, a cultural troop with drummers and dancers, the First Lady, and a bunch of other non-energy, non-government people. Never mind the mockery of our nation for sponsoring people to go to someone else’s land to drum and dance at the commissioning of a super tanker that lifts crude oil. Meanwhile those excluded from the trip are the Energy Minister (in the United States at the time) and the ranking member of the Parliamentary Committee on Energy, who was dropped at the last minute.

So Ghanaians must know that as their government announces austerity measures and a doubling of tariffs on basic services to further squeeze those already struggling to survive, that same government is sending drummers and dancers to a far away foreign land not to perform to earn foreign exchange, but to entertain energy officials who, more than likely, had cultural entertainment as the very last thing on their minds. And as if that is not insulting enough, that same government spends 7.6% more on its budget, but declares a “savings” in expenditure of 8 million Ghana Cedis. You know, it is one thing to lack the ability to govern; it is another thing entirely to mislead the Ghanaian people who elected you to govern them. So now, when the NDC tells you to look up, look down for your own good.