I wrote My Take last week sitting in the First Anniversary Lecture of my friend Anthony Akoto Ampaw. The deep thinker, Prof, H. Kwasi Prempeh, delivered the paper on the theme; “The Problems of Democracy in the 4^th Republic”. He was as thought-provoking as the discussants, including Prof. Dzodzi Tsikata and Sulemana Braima who joined him on the topic; “The Crisis of Citizenship in Contemporary Ghanaian Democracy: Lessons from the Life and Times of the late A. Akoto Ampaw”.

I wrote today’s Take listening to Prof. Stephen Adei and others at the 25^th Anniversary event of the Ghana Integrity Initiative – GII, that is the local chapter of global watchdog, Transparency International.

I was inspired to conclude that three things hold back the progress of this beautiful country and endanger its peace;

1.  extreme partisanship of the NDC/NPP duopoly that divides even tribes and families;
2. corruption, especially grand corruption that enriches the few and impoverishes the majority in country rich in gold, cocoa and oil; and
3. the indiscipline that allows reckless unlicensed driving, and galamsey to thrive in the face of laws against it.

In 2023, 87% of citizens were of the view that Ghana was badly managed. Today, by the latest Afrobarometer survey, 82% believe the country is headed in the wrong direction.

The report highlights current economic hardships with 82% of respondents saying they have experienced some level of poverty over the past year, a stark increase from just 19% in 2017.

Again, 7 out of 10 Ghanaians have gone without cash income at least once in the past year, while many face shortages in essential services like medicare, water, food, and cooking fuel.

A worrying 74% believe the corruption situation has worsened. They have seen a public officer caught with millions of dollars in her bedroom. People like her are not subject for prosecution. They are rather defended by the President. Prof. Adei insists widespread corruption in high public office is no longer a matter of perception but reality. He invites us to look at the cost of primary elections alone when the political parties are doing their internal elections.

A CDD survey in 2022 revealed it cost over 100 million dollars and over 4 million Ghana Cedis to run a successful presidential and parliamentary campaigns respectively. They do not get these huge sums from space. They steal it from your taxes. He indicts those involved for demanding bribes. He is sad-worried that the institutions set up to fight corruption are themselves very corrupt; the Executive, Parliament, the Judiciary.

For Prof. Adei, corruption is not receding because leaders don't mean it when they say they are committed to fighting it. He believes we may now be dealing with double or more of the three billion dollars figure on record as the amount that is unaccounted for each year. Ghana is at the IMF how much?

He joins the GII and Ghana Anti-Corruption Coalition’s years of campaign to adopt the civil law reverse burden of proof for corruption. The need, including for rules, as advanced by CHRAJ Commissioner, Dr. Joseph Whittal, will ensure that people accused of acquiring wealth beyond their means will be the ones to prove they got the wealth by legitimate means.

Next week, I hope to elaborate on the long-standing proposed approach to implementing the unexplained wealth provisions in Chapter 24 of the Constitution and why current Conduct of Public Officers Bill must not pass if assets declared will not be subject to verification and publication, and if prosecution for offences under it will not be by the OSP but the often-complicit Attorney-General’s Department.

What a sham are we up to? And that’s My Take.

Samson Lardy ANYENIN

November 2, 2024