Akufo-Addo is more on a pleasure trip to Upper West Region than a working visit – Lawra NDC

The attention of the NDC in the Lawra Constituency has been drawn to reports circulating on social media about a planned visit to the Upper West Region by the President of Ghana His Excellency Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo Addo.

The Communications bureau of the Lawra constituency NDC takes the opportunity to warmly welcome him to the Upper West Region for his intended two days tour. Though, he was massively rejected by the region considering the outcome of the results of the 2020 presidential elections, the people of the Upper West Region will extend to him, a reception befitting his status as the President of Ghana
While welcoming him to the Region, it is significant to put on the record, the open biases in his itinerary in the selection of the areas of his tour of the region.

Regrettably, we have observed that the President chooses to tour only the three constituencies in the Upper West Region which have representations in our Parliament on the ticket of the NPP. As the President of the Republic, H.E Nana Akufo Ado is in-charge of the administration of the whole country as well as the upper West Region, and also disburses the national kitty, as he deems it fit. Therefore he should be seen as being fair to all sections and groupings in the Region regardless of political affinities. But that is not what we are seeing in this visit. What is being served to the people of the Upper West Region, is clearly a divisive strategy intended to reward those constituencies which voted for his party, whilst denying others that voted against the NPP. This is unbecoming of a President whose expectations are to be unifying and all-embracing of all manner of people who constitute the Upper West Region and the Country we call Ghana.

It is equally important to point out that in the itinerary of the President’s two days tour of the region, he has selected to pay courtesy calls to only three Paramount Chiefs in the region even though there are as many as seventeen Paramount Chiefs in the Region. And glaringly, the Chiefs he will be engaging with in the 3 constituencies happen to be in the constituencies which voted for the candidates of his party, the NPP in the 2020 parliamentary elections. That is Sissala East (Tumu), Lambussie, and Nandom. As for the courtesy call on the Wa- Naa, he has no choice but to do so because, his aircraft will be landing on the soil of the Wa-Naa, the Overlord of the Waala Traditional Area.

In our view, snubbing the other Chiefs and their subjects because of a jaundiced political perception does not bode well for a cohesive and a united nation. We therefore call on the President to review and revise the itinerary of his tour to the Upper West Region to demonstrate that he is, indeed, the President of the country but not the leader of a divided country.

In addition to the above issues, there are many lingering questions which require urgent answers from the President regarding his current tour.

We have observed from the President’s tour that he is more on a pleasure trip to the Upper West Region than a working visit. This is because, there are hardly any projects lined up either for commissioning or inspection except the Business Resource Center in Tumu and the purported inspection of some unnamed projects in Nandom. This comes to confirm the neglect the Upper West Region has suffered under the Akufo Addo administration in his first term. No projects for commissioning and no projects for inspection in the Upper West Region.
Secondly, it is very curious to observe that one of the so-called important projects of the NPP in the run up to the 2020 elections, the “Almighty” Dikpe bridge in the Lawra Municipality/Constituency did not attract the attention of the President for inspection. This was a project whose sod cutting in November 2020 was done amidst a huge cloud of fanfair, media coverage, and pageantry . We still can not understand why the President is not interested in ascertaining the progress of work? Why so? Is this because the sod cutting ceremony which was intended to be used to hoodwink the electorate of the Lawra Constituency to vote for the NPP in the 2020 elections? Since then the site has been abandoned for rodents, reptiles and ruminants as their new habitat. Nine months have passed since then and there is absolutely no activity at the site. We ask Mr. President, when is the construction of the Dikpe Bridge going to start, or has it become one of the failed promises?

The NDC is also concerned about the treatment being meted out to the Lawra-Naa, Naa Puowelle Karbo lll in particular in the scheme of things. From his itinerary, the President is going to pass through Lawra on his way to visit Nandom and Lambussie and also on his way back to Wa to enplane again to Accra. And yet the President has not found time and space in his itinerary to pay a courtesy call on the Lawra-Naa, the Father of the immediate past NPP Member of Parliament for Lawra, Hon. Anthony Karbo. We fail completely to appreciate the import of the President’s action. Indeed we are pained as a people of the Lawra Constituency to be treated the way H.E. Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo Addo the President of the Republic of Ghana has treated us.

In essence, we are calling on him to widen the scope of his tour to include the other constituencies and Paramountcies in the areas in the region.

Aloysius Daanoma
(Lawra Constituency Communications Officer)