Correspondence from Upper West

Former President John Dramani Mahama has rated the current economic downturn in the country as very severe than what the country went through during the 1983 famine and droughts.

Citing reasons for his claims, Mr. John Mahama said the present economic situation Ghanaians are enduring comes with high cost of living.

He said this at a gathering of party supporters and sympathizers in the Sissala East District Tuesday, May 9, 2023, during his campaign tour of the Upper West Region ahead of the May 13, NDC's presidential and parliamentary primaries.

"Our country has never been in such a chaotic, messy economic situation before in our history. The last time things were so hard that we remember in our history for those of you who were born was in 1983 when we had droughts and bushfires and there was hunger in the land. But even then, if you look at and compare it to now, the hardship now is even as bad... because, the cost of things are very expensive. Inflation has gone up. And aside from that, even in 1983, we were still paying our debt. We didn't say we couldn't pay our debt. But today, we have borrowed so much that we cannot pay our debt and we're going around the whole world begging them to forgive us."

"When I travel abroad to a conference or something, they used to have a very high opinion of Ghana. So they ask what has happened. And so, I travel abroad and people ask me, Ghana, what happened? What happened to you? And you can't explain," the former president explained.

He spoke against the kind of political gimmicks the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) often find refuge in to calm Ghanaians when things are moving on well for the government ever since they came to power.

He wondered why African countries who were also ravaged by the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic were still able to be paying their national debts when Ghanaian government was busily begging for its debts to be cancelled, blaming the overborrowing of the country on the benefits the Finance Minister's bank allegedly enjoys from each borrowing the country makes.

"This government at first when they came if things were not going well, they say, Mahama, Mahama. Everyday, Mahama, as if I was still the President. Then, when the people got fed up with Mahama as an excuse, they came (with) Covid-19 sickness that's what caused it (hardship) and when they (Ghanaians) got fed up, then they came, Russia-Ukrain, Russia-Ukrain. And the question I ask is, why is Cote'Ivoire still paying it debts? Why is Togo still paying its debts? Even Burkina Faso that is in crisis is still paying its debts. Even Mali is still paying paying its debts. Why Ghana alone? It's because the Finance Minister is the President's cousin and his banks makes money anytime Ghana borrows," he argued.

John Mahama who is seeking to lead the NDC in the 2024 general elections to annex power from the NPP will need to wade off a challenge by Dr. Kwabena Duffour, a former Finance Minister under John Atta Mills reign and Mr. Kojo Bonsu, a former mayor of Kumasi, before being able to do so.