Former National Nasara coordinator and member of the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) communication team, Alhaji Abubakar Lakulaku Suleman has said President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, made a wrong move by appointing his cousin as Finance Minister.
According to the former Nasara coordinator, the NPP has competent people who can been appointed into government in order to get the job done.
Touching on how the country, reached its current economic situation, the former Nasara coordinator, told Nana Otu Darkon on CTV’s Dwa Bre Mu, Monday, 20 March 2023, that: “This thing if we discuss it, you won’t know where you are coming from and where you’re headed.”
Alhaji Suleman noted that the party’s current problem, is allowing the leader of the party to select who forms government to the detriment of other competent party members.
He said: “Yes it is true that NPP is governing us, it is a party that voted to create government, but our problem is that when we select a leader to lead the party does not mean when the party assumes the reigns of government, nobody can say anything and that is where we are as a party.
“We have very elite and educated people when we talk about NPP but they are not in government. They are there, we have more, because the party doesn’t stand firm. When you get elected as presidential candidate and you become president, it does not mean you should bring your people to fill government positions.”
He further noted that: “Yes, you [the president] have the prerogative to choose who makes up your government but you can’t take up all the percentage. You must give the party a chance to bring people who can do the job. “
According to the former Nasara coordinator, it was wrong for the President to have appointed his cousin as Finance Minister.
“Like me, if I become president, I’ll never bring a family person to fill that position, where there is money, Finance. Today the party has kicked against it, parliamentarians have requested that you remove him, where did that get to, even the person, when he’s ill, and the angel of death was coming for him, he was still holding on to the position, so someone will also sit somewhere and wonder exactly what is there.”
Reacting to the assertion that President Akufo-Addo is not the first President to have appointed a family member as a government appointee, because former President John Agyekum Kufuor also appointed his brother Addo Kufuor, Defence Minister, the former Nasara coordinator indicated that the two appointments are different.
“Ken Ofori-Atta, where have you seen him on any platform apart from 2008 when the President was contesting as candidate?” he quizzed.
He explained that: “But the former defence Minister you’re talking about, Addo Kufuor was a parliamentary candidate. He was even supportive of Akufo-Addo against his brother but when the brother came, he united the party, he brought everybody on board, when President Kufour won, even those who had insulted him that he can’t be a leader and all that, when he won, he brought everybody on board.
“No [President Akufo-Addo, has not brought everybody on board his government as President]. So the problem we’re facing now, are you expecting me to come here and defend it[government]. I’m asking myself, look at the way people are dying, when you read 1st Timothy 6:7, it says ‘for we bring nothing into this world’ so what at all are we fighting for? The cash you’re stashing away, and making people suffer, if you die and they put you in the casket, are they going to put it inside? He quizzed.
He added: “So this country, it is leadership that is taking us backwards because we’ve travelled severally, all the time, can’t our leaders just pick one of those things from the places we travel, maybe America and say we’re implementing it for the whole year?”
