Motivational speaker and Chief Executive of Golden Future Promotions, Charles Sam says it is time the country started focusing on development instead of aiming at achieving peace and stability especially as Ghanaians go to the polls in December to elect a president and parliamentarians. “The next elections in 2012, December 7 is not an election like the normal thing dwelling on peace, stability, what we’ve done till now because clearly we’re far behind time” Mr. Sam said on Multi TV’s political talk show, Minority Caucus. According to him, “at 55 (years of independence), I am declaring ...that this election should be the cutting (off) point for fixation or fetish or dancing around stability, peace in terms of economics, in terms of the democracy we’re practicing, in terms of our lives in general...we have done quite well as a country”. He indicated there is a “disconnect since the time Kwame Nkrumah left. We’ve gone down the path of self destruction, mediocrity and we haven’t achieved anything. I’ll be honest with you, compared to other countries we started with, Ghana I say so, that within that context, we have failed as a nation.” “We must understand clearly that we have failed as a nation because if you look at where Nkrumah left us off, we should have built on that” he said adding “other nations have built on that”. Touching on the developmental legacy bequeathed to the country by its first president, Charles Sam noted the country would have been more competitive than it is today if it had taken advantage of that legacy. He thus suggested the time has come for the country to leverage its much touted democratic credentials to create jobs, improve upon industrial development as well as venture into the export of “all kinds of things around the world to capture local money and international money as well.”