A flagbearer hopeful of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Dr. Owusu Afriyie Akoto, has said that he is the only candidate among the ten vying for the flagbearer position of the NPP who has big plans for Ghana to make life comfortable for all.
According to him, his vision of using agriculture as the bedrock to develop other sectors of the economy as well as his ambitious project of establishing businesses for the NPP are so practical that when given the nod to implement them, Ghanaians will feel the change that they have been craving for so many years.
He said having toured the length and breadth of the country and experienced the low morale of the people as a result of the economic difficulties they are going through, he is more energized at this moment in his life to break the general principles of business and management and make life meaningful for all.
In an interview with Dr. Afriyie Akoto at his campaign office in Accra on Tuesday, August 15, 2023, he said his vision of establishing businesses for the NPP is not a new innovation as the project is being implemented in other jurisdictions around the world and generating a lot of money and creating jobs for the teeming unemployed party activists.
“The morale of the people are down. The revival of their morale is based on what I intend to do. I have big plans for Ghana – plans that can generate income for the development of our great NPP to pay our activists handsomely to encourage them to work hard for this party; and plans to use agriculture to develop the other sectors of the economy. These are ambitious plans that I have prioritized to implement when given the nod to lead the NPP and Ghana”, he noted.
Explaining what he intends to do for the UP tradition when elected as its flagbearer, Dr. Akoto, who is a former two-term Member of Parliament (MP) for Kwadaso, said his vision for the party is to set up a chain of party-owned businesses at national, regional, and constituency levels that will be managed by a holding company.
These businesses, he noted, will generate revenue to run the party as well as provide gainful employment opportunities for its members to alleviate their plight. This ambitious plan, he added, is the best sustainable means of effectively managing the party at all levels as is being implemented in Taiwan by the Kuomintang (KTM) or Nationalist Party of Taiwan, ANC in South Africa, RPF in Rwanda, the French Communist Party, Social Democrats in Germany and Austria, Scandinavian socialist and communist parties among many others.
KMT of Taiwan
For instance, the Kuomintang (KMT) or Nationalist Party of Taiwan amassed a vast business empire of banks, investment companies, petrochemical firms, and television and radio stations. The party which is currently struggling financially was thought to have been the world’s richest political party at a point, with assets once estimated to be around US$2 to US$10billion.
ANC in South Africa
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RPF in Rwanda
Crystal Ventures, the Rwanda Patriotic Front’s (RPF) holding company, has investments in everything from furniture to finance. It owns the country’s biggest milk processor, its finest coffee shops, and some of its priciest real estate. Its contractors are building Kigali’s roads. There are several firms offering security services in Rwanda but the guards from ISCO, part of Crystal Ventures, are the only ones who carry guns. The company is reckoned to have some US$500million of assets.
“My vision for the party is really simple in the sense that it is something that is happening elsewhere. It is not my own imagination. We are talking about the African National Congress (ANC) of South Africa which owns mining companies, insurance companies and owns shares in big companies in South Africa and beyond so they can afford to pay average wages and salaries to their functionaries and activists on the ground and create jobs and others. That is the vision that I want to bring to the New Patriotic Party and that will really put us in a level which will enable us not to only break the eight but the 16, the 32 and whatever to help the people of this country to develop and enjoy a good standard of living like any other descent society”, he posited.
Commenting on his vision for the country, Dr. Akoto said “this country is sitting on wealth. It hasn’t been exploited. My vision is to use agriculture to spearhead the breaking of poverty cycle in this country. We’ve been financing our development with debts; pensioners’ funds and borrowing money from the International Monetary Fund. Since the beginning of our republic, we have had to rely on them for our development. It won’t work; it has never worked, and it will never work. We have to get away from the cycle of borrowing money to fix our roads and finance our infrastructure. Agriculture has the tools to be able to do that. The farmers of Ghana have demonstrated to me clearly in my six years at the Ministry of Food and Agriculture and given the necessary support, they will deliver. So, to me the priority is that we will support farmers in whatever that they are doing and create the institutions to assist them”.
It was based on this vision that he led the Ministry of Food and Agriculture to establish the Tree Development Authority (TDA) to develop six tree crops – rubber, oil palm, coconut, mango, cashew and Shea under one roof to be developed to the level of cocoa where production could generate between US$6billion to US$12billion for the country annually.
“This is the vision that I have. Compare this vision with the others and you will see that this is a very doable and very easily digested concept that can turn around the country. So, I am appealing to the delegates that your best bet is Dr. Owusu Afriyie Akoto. So, when it comes to August 26 and November 4, remember me in”, he noted.
