A member of the communications team of the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP), Richard Nyamah, has described the flagbearer of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) as the only contestant in this year’s elections who has corruption tag hovering around his neck.
He said the country cannot be entrusted into the hands of John Dramani Mahama because his records in the corruption fight and other areas of the economy are way below average.
Mr Nyamah’s comments come after private legal practitioner and a member of the NDC, Godwin Edudzi Tamakloe, said President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has no credibility in the fight against graft in Ghana.
In the view of Mr Tamakloe, Mr Mahama demonstrated his willingness and enough commitment in the fight against corruption when he was in office, unlike Mr Akufo-Addo, who he said has failed to show that level of commitment.
“Mahama is more than credible than Akufo-Addo,” he told Johnnie Hughes on New Day on TV3 Tuesday, September 15.
He added: “John Mahama has dared Akufo-Addo and his poodle, the Special Prosecutor, that you have been in power for almost four years, if he had been involved in any corruption matter, you have all the investigative bodies, and four years you have not been able to do anything.
“The record is that when it comes to credibility President Akufo-Addo has none.”
Reacting to his comments on the same show, Mr Nyamah indicated that when Mr Mahama was the Vice President of Ghana, his boss, the late former president John Evans Atta Mills, initiated investigations against him over a transaction he was involved in.
This he said smacks of a corrupt leader.
“He is the only presidential candidate that has the corruption tag on him. When he was the Vice President, his sitting president had launched investigations against him in the Embraer deal.
“Why is he refusing to talk about the Airbus saga? We have told him he is the Government Official 1 and why is he refusing to talk about it?
“Tell me one thing that you can accuse Akufo-Addo of,” he dared.
Meanwhile, Mr Mahaha in June this year denied reports that he benefited financially from the purchase of some aircraft for the Ghana Armed Forces when he was in office.
He said due diligence was followed in the purchase of the two aircraft for the Ghana Armed Forces.
“Let me state without any equivocation that no financial benefit accrued to me. Neither was there any form of inducement in the purchase of the aircraft. My singular motivation was to equip and retool the Ghana Armed Forces in a manner that would make the discharge of their national and international roles efficient and less burdensome and for all the sacrifices that our men and women in uniform make, they do not deserve less,” the three-time flagbearer of the NDC told the state-owned Daily Graphic.
He added: “I am happy that the said aircrafts have become the backbone of the Ghana Air Force and its operations. They are used for troop transportation, logistics deployment and medical evacuation.”
In the report, he said he felt fulfilled that as Vice-President and later as President and Commander-in-Chief of the Ghana Armed Forces, his “overarching desire to ensure that our men and women in uniform were provided with the tools and equipment they needed to fulfil their constitutional mandate of ensuring public safety, security and protecting the territorial integrity of our nation were reasonably met”.
“I am proud that under my tenure as Chairman of the Armed Forces Council and as Commander-in-Chief, the security services saw the biggest retooling and equipping in the history of Ghana.
“All the processes and negotiations by the government in the acquisition of the aircraft were conducted directly with Airbus and my administration without any untoward influence either directly or indirectly through any agents it may have appointed. Indeed, nowhere in the available UK Court Documents has it been said that Airbus paid any public or government official on the side for the purchase of the aircraft,” he stated.
By Laud Nartey|3newsd.com|Ghana