Penplusbytes in collaboration with Media General’s Election Command Centre will later today hold a national forum on political party manifestos and the fight against corruption in Ghana.
In the lead up to the 2020 elections in Ghana, delivery of infrastructure promises by the two dominant parties and corruption is dominating the political discourse.
Holding duty bearers to account for their manifesto promises is important because such promises influence voter behavior and serve as the yardstick to measure the performance of political parties.
A study conducted by Penplusbytes with support from the UK-AID funded Strengthening Action Against Corruption (STAAC) programme, gave ordinary citizens the opportunity to speak out about how they perceive the issue of corruption and how government is dealing with it as well as assess the specific sector promises proposed by the current government to fight this menace.
The study was supported with the tracking, verification and evaluation of various assurances given by the Executive on the floor of Parliament which are also captured as flagship promises in the 2016 NPP manifesto under another Penplusbytes’ project “Connecting Citizens to Parliament” being implemented in partnership with the Committee on Government Assurances (CGA) of Ghana’s Parliament.
This Wednesday national forum intends to provide a unique platform and an opportunity for stakeholders: statesmen and women, political parties, citizens, civil society, researchers and academia, to dive deep into how political parties formulate their manifestos, the role manifestos play in elections campaign; what informs the implementation of manifesto promises and the challenges of merging manifesto promises with the long-term national development plans.
The forum which is under the theme: “Does Manifesto Matter? – How political parties use manifestos to tackle corruption in Ghana”, will bring together major stakeholders to dialogue dispassionately on policies, strategies and institutional arrangements to prevent corruption, drawing insights from Penplusbytes Metogu research report.
Under the auspices of Election Command Centre, the event comes off Wednesday, October 14, 2020 at the TV3 Executive Theater from 3:00pm to 5:00pm.
Panelist to discuss the issues will be the Executive Director of Center for Democratic Development (CDD-Ghana), Prof. H. Kwasi Prempeh, Executive Director of Institute for Democratic Governance (IDEG), Dr. Emmaunel Akwetey and Research Consultant for Penplusbytes, Dr. George-Grandy Hallow, moderated by Alfred Ocansey, Senior journalist at Media General.
Attendance is strictly by invitation.
By 3news.com|Ghana