Last week, we were told by the Deputy Minister for Local Government that the NDC government had outperformed the NPP in just three years. Elvis Afriyie Ankrah gave a list of projects the government has undertaken to improve the lives of Ghanaians across the country. The list included bungalows for teachers, district hospitals, clinics, schools and public toilets.
I don’t know why anyone would think it is cool to list public toilets as an achievement but it is up there with clinics.
Anyway, Mr. Afriyie Ankrah promised to resign if journalists prove his list to be false. This isn’t the first time we are hearing about the achievements of the NDC government. About three or so months ago, the green book was launched. In it a list, pictures of buildings and projects, government has completed over the last three years.
And government officials never fail to remind Ghanaians of the achievements of the Mills-Mahama led government. The way they go on, you’d think Ghanaians were not around when they made those giant strides.
To be fair, the NDC isn’t the only guilty party, the NPP touted its achievement all the time when they were in power and still do every now and then.
In fact, it is the reason why the NDC keeps telling us they have outperformed the NPP. It is also why we get excuses like “the NPP did same when they were in power, why are they questioning it now,” when things go wrong. I’m unable to rank the two parties since there is no standard or national plan to tick boxes. But I would like the self-patting to stop.
I promise the President and his men, Ghanaians are not as clueless as we seem. We do notice the small changes when they occur. We not need visual aids (the green book) to tell us a hospital has been built in Ohiamadwen. Neither do we need to be told every five minutes, about the success of the government’s free school uniform program.
The people who benefit will spread the word (that is if GTV fails to drum it in.) And whiles we are at it, it isn’t necessary to buy airtime to tell the world how the Single Spine Pay Structure has improved the lot of teachers. Implementing a pay policy is not an achievement; that is what elected governments do.
And just so we are clear, government is not doing Ghanaians a favor, when it to fixes roads, provide portable water, clean our cities, build schools, provide equipment for our hospitals. We will not send them thank you cards or a keg of palmwine to show appreciation. We deserve the best, and we’ve earned the infrastructure the NDC will provide. We pay them after all.
