Mahama must read data before he speaks – Bawumia

The Vice President, Dr Mahamudu Bawumia, has asked former President John Dramani Mahama to read the data on government’s performance before he engages the public.

According to the Vice President, data available suggests that the NPP-led government has performed better in every sector and expects the former President to be truthful when he engages Ghanaians.

“This time in the lives of our country is really not a time for politics, we are facing a global pandemic and the focus of the President is leading to make sure the right things are done to protect the lives of Ghanaians. that notwithstanding, we have seen that the former President John Mahama has been making some statements and it has been proven that many of those statements are untruths.

“The data is very clear and so my humble advice to the former President is that he should take a look at the data before you speak otherwise you would end up embarrassing yourself. Agriculture growth, we have performed better, Industrial growth, we have performed better, Inflation rate, we have performed better…this is the data…when it comes to jobs we have created more jobs,” Dr Bawumia stated on the sidelines of a COVID-19 meeting at the Jubilee House on Monday, 4 May 2020.

He added “I can say without any fear of contradiction, the data shows that in the history of the Fourth Republic, there is no government that has provided as much infrastructure across all sectors in its first term than the first term the government of Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo. If you want to challenge that please bring your data.”

The response by the Vice President comes after Mr Mahama described President Akufo-Addo’s promise to construct 94 new hospitals in one year as knee-jerk and reactionary.

According to the NDC flagbearer, even though there is the need to improve on health infrastructure, the plan at doing so must be credible and well thought-through.

“When even more investment is required to augment the existing health infrastructure, it is important that the plan to do so is credible and clearly thought-through. What we should avoid is knee-jerk promises that appear reactive rather than products of critical thinking and well-coordinated response to an existing or emerging problem,” Mr. Mahama noted during the second edition of his Digital Conversation Thursday.

He also took shots at critics of his health infrastructure saying they were uninformed.

“It has been widely acknowledged that some of the critical investments that we [NDC administration] made in the health sector has been extremely useful and enabled Ghana to lessen the impact of this pandemic on our people and our nation. This acknowledgement bears out the vision and clear thinking that went into the massive investments we made in the health sector.

“There were uninformed and snipped remarks at the time with some questioning why many facilities were constructed. We were acutely aware however that these investments were necessary to modernise a very fragile and weak health system.”

Source: Ghana/Starrfm.com.gh