From Dumsor To ORAL: The Key Issues That Could Break The Goodwill For The Mahama Administration

The Mahama administration is being given the benefit of the doubt by Ghanaians but how long will the good will last?

The John Mahama administration has been enjoying significant goodwill from Ghanaians on the back of its comprehensive election victory.

Red flags like continued partisan appointments, high-profile instances of conflict of interest and the tolerance of alleged party foot soldiers rioting have done little to dim the enthusiasm of Ghanaians who gave the National Democratic Congress an overwhelming election victory in December 2024.

The consensus is that the Akufo-Addo administration left behind multiple crises for the Mahama administration to clean up with its so-called reset.

Executive Director of Global Infoanalytics, Mussa Dankwah, told YEN.com.gh that the government's strategy was to lower expectations by being honest about the expected challenges.

“This is to really set Ghanaian’s minds not to expect miracles now.”

Mahama described the country, already in the throes of an IMF bailout, as an abyss. He also asserted that the economy had been criminally mismanaged by the Akufo-Addo administration.

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Stakeholders in the business and economic sector have set their sights on the Mahama administration before coming out with its first real assessment of governance so far.

David Amoateng, the president of the Traders Advocacy Group, noted that for the first 100 days, the government really could not do much of consequence, save for the budget presentation.

“Anybody that is expecting that things will change within the first 100 days, I don’t think that person will be fair.”

For Amoateng, goodwill from the business community would continue if certain nuisance taxes were scrapped as promised.

This is a point that was echoed by Samson Asaki Awingobit, the Executive Secretary of the Importers and Exporters Association.

“We want to see that rationalisation of tax. We want to see that E-levy scrapped. We want to see that one per cent Covid levy scrapped. We want to see them reducing the VAT.”

Polling by Dankwa’s firm indicated that 70% of Ghanaians expected a significant turnaround in their fortunes. This is on the back of the 54% who said their prospects had increased over the last 12 months.

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The poll also found that 74% of Ghanaians felt the country was headed in the right direction. In contrast, in November 2024, 63% of those polled believed that Ghana was headed in the wrong direction.

With Ghana’s economic prospects unlikely to change dramatically in 2025, one thing Dankwa believes could make or break the government’s grace period is the handling of the power sector.

The government notably made steps in the right direction with its handling of the school feeding challenges, moving quickly to decentralise the process. Dankwah believes the government could build on that high by meeting expectations on the management of the power sector.

“The noise that used to come from there wasn’t very good but now we are hearing some positive feedback from there. That is a good wind that will continue so long as he can deal with the power crisis very well.”

Mahama's approach to corruption

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Another headliner for Ghanaians will be how the new administration deals with corruption. Ghana has dropped on the Global Corruption Perception Index from its score in 2024.

Ghana ranked 80th out of 180 countries and territories assessed in the latest report released by Transparency International.

The government made a lot of noise about its Operation Recover All Loot (ORAL) and Dankwah warned that Ghanaians are expecting tangible outcomes.

The preparatory ORAL committee claimed it had identified $21.19 billion in possible recoveries from corruption.

The plan to recover and prosecute alleged corruption in these offences remains unclear though the Special Prosecutor has taken big swings at Akufo-Addo appointees like former finance minister Ken Ofori-Atta and the immediate past leadership of the National Service Authority.

“They should be firm and resolute on the need to prosecute people who have been deemed to have misappropriated public funds... If you look at the noise around ORAL; if they don’t see tangible action, I think Ghanaians will get angry."

Source: YEN.com.gh