John Dramani Mahama has said if elected President in 2024, his government’s top priority will be to restore stability and inclusive growth to the economy.

This he said he will do by bringing the various indicators under control to relieve Ghanaians of their suffering.

“We will strictly enforce prudence and responsibility in the management of public finances by cutting out waste and ostentation, which have become common place under this administration. Together, we will build the Ghana we want,” he said at his campaign launch in the Volta region on Thursday, 2 March 2023.

“We shall restore faith in our almost collapsed financial system and embark on sweeping reforms at the Bank of Ghana.

“We shall actively pursue policies to ensure robust local participation in our banking, financial, telecommunications, mining, agriculture, agribusiness and manufacturing sectors.”

This he noted will be anchored on his government’s plan to grow the economy and create sustainable employment for the youth.

Mr Mahama further said his future government will make investments in productive sectors of the economy like agriculture, industry, technology, digitilisation and tourism to spur growth and generate jobs for the teeming youth who continue to lose hope by the day.

“With the limited fiscal space we are likely to inherit because of the mismanagement of the economy under NPP, a new NDC Government will give priority to continuing and completing abandoned and ongoing projects rather than rushing to commence new ones,” he promised.

He further assured that he would assemble and operate the leanest but most efficient government under the fourth republic.

“We will reduce, significantly, the size of government. As I announced in my Ghana We Want address at UPSA late last year, I will form a government of less than 60 ministers and deputy ministers of state. I will initiate and undertake the most far-reaching constitutional, political and governance reforms under the fourth republic aimed at restoring confidence in our democracy and governance systems while making life easier and better for our people.”

He also said he would initiate and undertake the most far-reaching constitutional, political and governance reforms aimed at restoring confidence in our democracy.

“We will continue and bring to conclusion the constitution review process began by President Atta Mills including a review of the controversial article 71 to reduce the number of office holders, and remove the disparities in privileges and emoluments vis a vis the public and civil service,” he said.

“The payment of ex-gratia to members of the executive under Article 71 will be scrapped. The necessary constitutional steps to abolish that payment will start in earnest in 2025. I will also begin the process to persuade other arms of government to accept same,” he added.

Mr Mahama further said issues pertaining to the excessive powers of the President, proper separation of powers, strengthening of parliament, restoring true independence to the judiciary, independent and quasi-independent state institutions and depoliticizing them will take centre stage.

With renewed vigor, the former President said a future NDC government will work to restore confidence in all institutions of state, so that “our people will see their institutions working for them as they should with utmost professionalism and non-interference from political actors.”

“We must, for instance, end the chaos that now characterizes the Computerized School Selection and Placement System for BECE graduates. As a first step, we should allow students to only complete their applications for SHS after they receive their BECE results. They will be in a better position to know their actual grades and match them with the cut-off grades and raw scores of the senior high schools they wish to be admitted to. This will moderate expectation, ensure effective demand based on real results and address uninformed demand. It will also root out corruption and blatant discrimination from the process,” he added.