‘Who’s more corrupt than Mahama and his cabal of thieves?’ – Effah Dartey
Captain Nkrabeah Effah Dartey
A former flag bearer aspirant of the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP), Mr Nkrabeah Effah Dartey, has said Ghana has not had a leader “as corrupt as former President John Dramani Mahama” and his “cabal of thieves”.
According to the retired Captain, under the Mahama-led NDC administration, corruption was the order of the day.
He noted that when Mr Mahama was president, the auditor-general disclosed in his report that state money went missing and could not be accounted for, and, so, the NDC has no moral right to tag the NPP administration as corrupt.
The former Member of parliament for the Berekum constituency said these in response to a press conference addressed by the National Communications Officer of the NDC, Mr Sammy Gyamfi, in Accra on Monday, 30 August 2021, where he described the NPP government as a bunch of thieves plundering the state coffers.
Mr Gyamfi said at the press conference that the NDC is confident that come 2024, all well-meaning Ghanaians who wish to see the progress of the nation, will join forces with the party to “break the eight years of stealing, break the eight years of nepotism, break the eight years of lawlessness and impunity, break the eight years of deception and broken promises and break the eight years of injustice and intolerance.”
Speaking to Joshua Kojo Mensah on the 505 news programme on Class91.3FM on the same day with Joshua Kojo Mensah on the NDC presser, Mr Effah Dartey called on the biggest opposition party to provide any evidence of corruption it has against any government appointee to the Special Prosecutor to investigate.
He said: “He [Sammy Gyamfi] is accusing the New Patriotic Party administration of corruption. It is an attractive song, an attractive melody, which all opposition parties throughout the world, always use to castigate those in government”.
“What I expect Sammy Gyamfi to do or to tell Ghanaians is to give specific analysis, specific details that the minister for so so and so has done so so and so; that this contract or this or that has been undersigned or over-invoiced”.
“Give specific examples”, he said, adding: “We have appointed a special prosecutor whose job is to ensure sanity on the public purse, so, if you think you have evidence of corruption against any public official, more so ministers of state, and you’re accusing them of corruption, carry all your data to the special prosecutor and secure conviction”.
“That will make your case credible but if you go to stand on a treetop and hold a press conference and you use words like ‘corruption, abysmal failure, incompetent’ and so on, you make me laugh and it is sad”, the former lawmaker said.
He continued: “Sammy Gyamfi is playing an old song, an old song which we have heard so many times before. Compared to when John Mahama was President of Ghana, the corruption that took place in this country has he forgotten so soon where a whole car was caught on the road to Kumasi full of millions of cedis. What happened to that case? Nobody knows. No official explanation [given] and even the auditor-general’s report [had said] the accounts of central government had gotten missing and cannot be accounted for under the watch of John Mahama”.
“So, if there’s anybody who is more corrupt than John Mahama and his cabal of thieves, I wonder if we can get anybody…” he stated.
