Dr. Bawumia at the NPP Conference in Kumasi
Vice-President Mahamudu Bawumia has again touted the NPP’s “unparalleled records” in transforming the lives of ordinary Ghanaians in the Fourth Republic, as compared to the NDC, and called for the strengthening of party-government relations to facilitate another victory for the party in 2024.
He said the NPP had become the most important driver of the Ghanaian vision and development agenda, and is responsible for the most important policies which touch every Ghanaian in every corner of the country, citing the National Health Insurance Scheme, School Feeding Programme, the Free Maternal Care, the Free SHS, Free TVET programme, among others.
Addressing the NPP’s annual national delegates’ conference in Kumasi yesterday, Dr Bawumia expressed the hope that the party “will be able to break the eight because our record is a superior record.”
“Whether we are talking about agriculture, industry, roads, housing, education, health, transformational policies like digitalization, social interventions and so on the comparison between us and the NDC will be like night and day,” he stated.
Hard work by gov’t
“We have worked hard as a government under the leadership of H.E. Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, and are committed to continuing to serve the good people of Ghana. Protecting our efforts, vision and legacy means we necessarily have to break the eight as we have termed it.
“In this regard, let us all be aware that breaking the eight will not be easy. It has not been done before in our history, but I believe that if we are united, we will break the eight. United we stand, divided we fall,” he said
He said the success of the NPP would depend on how well “we conduct ourselves going forward; a strong united party with a focus on highlighting our successes while countering the desperate, misleading and misguided NDC propaganda. Rather than taking down each other, we must focus on taking down the NDC who will be a disaster for this country.”
Covid-19 scare
Dr Bawumia said COVID-19 pandemic had increased the cost of living virtually everywhere in the world, including countries like the US, UK, Germany, Japan, Nigeria, Cote d’Ívoire, among others.
“Nevertheless, it is important to remind ourselves that notwithstanding the global economic adverse impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on economic growth, debts and deficits, at the macroeconomic level, inflation in Ghana today, at 12.2%, is lower than it was in 2016 (15.4%), average Bank lending rates in Ghana today (21%) are much lower than they were 2016 (32%),” he said.
Referencing the Bank of Ghana, the Vice-President said the average exchange rate depreciation over the last four years (7.3%) is the lowest for any first term government since 1992, saying the year 2020 recorded one of the lowest rate of depreciation in the last 28 years with the cumulative exchange rate depreciation of 2.6% in November 2021 this year being lower than 9.7% depreciation recorded in 2016.
He stated: “Our record of creating jobs (over 750,000 jobs) is vastly superior to the record of the NDC government which froze public service recruitment. So, if our performance on the key macroeconomic indicators (inflation, interest rates, depreciation, external reserves, trade balance and jobs) during the worst global pandemic in 100 years is better than your performance without such a pandemic, how can you say your economic management is better?”
Digitalization
The Vice-President stated that the current transformational leadership being spearheaded by President Akufo-Addo is phenomenal and historic as it builds on the legacies of President J.A Kufuor.
He said the country, for the first time, had successfully issued a digital national ID card; implemented a digital property address system; introduced Mobile Money Interoperability, while any Ghanaian who has a national ID card can open a bank account using their mobile phone, with over 80% of adults in Ghana today now having Tax Identification Numbers versus four per cent in 2017
He added that Ghana now has drones for medical delivery, which is the world’s largest medical drone delivery service.
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