Vice President Dr Mahamudu Bawumia has descended heavily on the immediate past president, John Dramani Mahama, for recent ethnocentric statements attributed to him.

The flagbearer of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) is said to have shared an article written by Bolgatanga Central Member of Parliament (MP) Isaac Adongo and insinuated that Akyems are ‘Sakawa Boys’.

In shared post on his Facebook page, former president Mahama also wrote: “Grandpa must go”.

This has incensed some Ghanaians including the President, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, who wondered why the clergy and senior citizens have not called the former president to order.

“What can be the basis for such a remark? If it’s a public act that you have a problem with, fair enough but that the people who are doing it are given this ethnic branding, that cannot be right,” he told members of the Ghana Catholic Bishops’ Conference who called on him at the Jubilee House on Friday.

“That’s the kind of language that we don’t want in our politics. So I am 100 per cent on the same wavelength as you as to the kind of politics that will make sense in our [country]".

Adding his voice to the condemnation, Vice President Bawumia told a gathering at Gushiegu in the Northern Region on Sunday, September 6, 2020 that Mr Mahama must apologise for the comments and withdraw them immediately.



“How do you take a whole tribe and say they are Sakawa? How do you do that?” he wondered.

“And my message to John Mahama is that you cannot win this presidency with tribalism. Ghana has gone beyond tribalism.”

He said this year’s election will be fought on track records “not on tribalism and therefore we want unity”.

“We want a president who will unite us and Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has demonstrated that he is that person by what he has done not only in Dagbon but in other places.”

To Dr Bawumia, it is the lack of competence and good trackrecord that is making the former president resort to tribalism in his campaign.

“Come and show your competence in the delivery for the people of Ghana. But because you could not show your competence, you are resorting to tribalism. We will not stand for tribalism. Nana Akufo-Addo, yes he is an Akyem man but he is a Ghanaian. Akyem people are proud Ghanaians as other tribes.”