John Mahama’s speech at Ghana at a crossroads event [Full text]

Instead, Ghanaians have been subjected to excruciating hardships and deprivation resulting directly from the mismanagement of the economy by a government that lacks the humility to accept responsibility, and the capacity to appropriately diagnose the root causes of the challenges that have brought us here.

This should never have been the case for a government that has been fortunate to receive far more resources in the last five years than almost all governments before them under the fourth republic, put together.

My brothers and sisters, in the hands of a more responsible and prudent administration, the resources that have been available to this administration, should have resulted in quantum leaps in the standard of living of Ghanaians and we should have recorded major progress as a nation.

Instead, and rather unfortunately, we were fed the same litany of buck-passing, denial, and nonchalance that the people of Ghana have been served by this President and his government over the last five years.

They have claimed that the NDC government added power generation capacity that we did not need and that due to ‘Take or Pay’ clauses in the power contracts, they have been forced to pay US$1 billion to Independent Power Producers (IPP) every year, since 2017.

In the last few years, several notable critics of this government and social activists have been subjected to unjustified arrests and prosecutions with some having already served custodial sentences.

It is obvious that this government has become edgy and jittery due to the myriad of problems it has created which have so frustrated Ghanaians and incurred their righteous indignation.