Deputy Minister of Education, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa has issued a stern warning to critics seeking to make political capital out of the country’s present economic situation vis-à-vis the cedi depreciation.
According to him, the cedi depreciation is not as a result of poor management of the economy by the Mahama administration but a global trend that has caught up with the country, stemming from previous actions by successive governments.
Hon. Okudzeto, who particularly picked on the former Deputy Communications Director of the opposition New Patriotic Party, Nana Akomea, wondered why he (Nana Akomea) and other cronies in the NPP would slam the incumbent government over the fall of the cedi as against major foreign trading currencies.
The former NPP Parliamentarian posited that the current leaders at the helm of affairs lacked the innovation to “resurrect” the “dead” currency, on Asempa FM’s “Ekosii Sen programme” on Monday.
“The quality of economic management is the biggest factor for the cedi depreciation. In five years the cedi has depreciated more than 100 percent”, Akomea bemoaned.
But addressing the issue on Radio Gold during a panel discussion programme “Alhaji and Alhaji”, Okudzeto Ablakwa argued that during the reign of the NPP, the cedi fell by about 30 percent as against what he claims is 7 percent in the fall of the cedi under the Mahama government.
He thus questioned the logic in Nana Akomea’s assertions that the ““mismanagement and incompetence” of Ghana’s economy by the National Democratic Congress (NDC) government is to be blamed for the free fall of the cedi.”
The NDC MP for North Tongu in the Volta Region further stated that per the reasoning of the former NPP Director of Communications “if we (Mahama government) have 7 percent and we’re so incompetent. And we’re so useless, then you who have 30% in your record; who are you? You must be worse than incompetent. You must be worse than useless.
“There’s been a lot of cheap opportunism where politicians this week have tried to cash in. Everybody is really taking a dive to see how they can gain some political mileage out of this situation. And I think that we ought to quickly disregard that and discard it totally,” Okudzeto Ablakwa added.