The 2024 Presidential Candidate of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), John Mahama has stated that the party does not take the massive support from the Volta Region for granted.

He expressed gratitude to the region for giving the NDC the highest percentage of total votes in general elections since the inception of the 4th Republic.

“We want to thank the Volta Region for standing behind the NDC over the years. We don’t take your support for granted.

"In NDC, we don’t call the Volta Region the World Bank for nothing. We call Volta Region the World Bank not because your votes are the highest in nominal terms.

"Because if you take the votes of Greater Accra, they are higher but of course, the population of Greater Accra is much bigger. But when it comes in percentage terms, no region comes close to Volta Region in terms of percentage”, he explained.

He added that the NDC had ensured the region received a fair share of development projects in previous administrations by investing in life-changing initiatives.

He outlined that successive governments had undertaken projects in education, health, transport, road, sanitation, water, and agriculture to improve the livelihoods of the region's people.

“You can’t quantify the level of transformation it has had on the lives of the people”, he added.

Mr Mahama said the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) had decided not to continue projects initiated by the NDC to the detriment of the region's people.

He said that NPP deployed propaganda to deceive electorates to vote for them, by enriching a few youths in the region “and then they will come and point to you, 'you see this one since he joined NPP, you see his life has changed, you have been following NDC, what have you got?'”

He lamented that the electorates buy into this ploy forgetting that NDC has implemented projects that would impact generations.

Mr Mahama advised against vote buying and entreated the electorates not to forget the 8-year hardship they had endured under the Akufo-Addo-Bawumia government.

“I am saying all these because elections are coming. They are going to come with the money again. They will ask for your Mobile Money numbers, MoMo and then they will put 200 and 500 for you.

But remember that you have lived 8 years of poverty, 8 years of hardships and that whatever money they give you, would not alleviate the crisis into which they have plunged you”, he advised.

Mr Mahama promised the NDC would continue with its infrastructure development agenda for the Volta Region, and invest in the sectors of tourism, agriculture, and industry among others to create jobs.

“In addition, we will build modern markets so that our people can come and trade in their goods. We will build a big market in Aflao, Asigame, so that on our side we also will have Asigame, our mothers can go there and trade and earn an income for themselves”, he said.

He promised to deploy a homegrown fiscal consolidation programme to help revive the country’s economy.