Nana Addo sees Ghanaians as “idio***ts” -John Mahama

Former President John Mahama has called on President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo to apologise to Ghanaians for deceiving them.
His comments come at the back of the latter who said his government will keep borrowing money to put up projects he described as “assets” to pay back those loans.

Speaking as the Guest of Honour at the Tony Elumelu Foundation Entrepreneurship Forum, in Lagos, Nigeria on Thursday, October 25, 2018, Nana Addo said “We will borrow money; everybody borrows money. The United States of America is one of the biggest debtors in the world. So borrowing money is not necessarily a betrayal of the concept of independence. The key for us in borrowing money is that we borrow money to create assets that will allow us to pay the money back. That is the key…If we borrow the money and use it properly it is an asset for us in expanding our economy and infrastructure.”

He said there is no contradiction between Ghana Beyond Aid agenda and the government borrowing.

He emphasized that there is nothing wrong with borrowing.

Mahama, addressing delegates of the Trobu constituency as part of his five-day campaign tour of the Greater Accra Region, he advised the NPP government to stop the hypocrisy.

Mahama said “When we criticise them [NPP], they don’t understand. The problem is not that something is bad, nobody ever said borrowing is bad. When we were in government, we didn’t say borrowing is bad, you borrow to invest in assets and everyone knows that, and when we were in government, we borrowed to invest in assets, we built hospitals, we built roads, we built interchanges, we extended electricity, we provided water, we expanded the port, we did all these projects, it was they [NPP], who said borrowing is bad.”

“So, when Ghanaians are criticising you today, it is because of what you said in the past, it is the hypocrisy that Ghanaians are angry with, and we’ve all your quotations about borrowing. You said: ‘Any idiot can borrow’. That’s what you said. And said: ‘The money is here, we don’t need to borrow to develop Ghana’. And today, if you have turned around and you see that you can borrow and invest in assets, you have to apologise to Ghanaians, and say: ‘We are sorry, we didn’t know, now we know, we’ll borrow’.

“But when you behave as if we are idiots, we don’t remember what you said and you say: ‘We’ll borrow because even the U.S.A is borrowing, of course, U.S. is borrowing, and so what? So, it is the hypocrisy of this government that is annoying Ghanaians and not that we don’t understand that you must borrow but you must not also over-borrow,” he stressed.