Parliament began debating the President’s State of the Nation Address (SONA) last Thursday, with both Majority and Minority legislators taking their turns to agree and disagree with the message.
The MPs, who commended the President for his message to the House last Wednesday, focused their debates on the economy, questions over whether the government borrowed to use for its intended purposes or otherwise, infrastructure and energy.
Other thematic areas hinged on health, education, taxes, investment, inflation and depreciation of the cedi, among others.
The debate would continue until next week Thursday when the leadership of the House would take their turns to conclude the debate.
President was honest with Ghanaians
Moving the motion for the debate to begin, the Deputy Majority Leader, Alexander Afenyo-Markin, said prior to coming into office of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) government, it outlined alternative policies such as free Senior High School (SHS) programme, restoration of allowances for trainees of Colleges of Education and nursing training and promised to reduce high utility tariffs.
“True to the words of the NPP, when it assumed office in 2017 efforts were made immediately to introduce the free SHS and there is no doubt on our minds as a people the programme has really helped the many who otherwise would not have had the opportunity to benefit from SHS education,” he said.
On utility tariffs, he argued that the National Democratic Congress (NDC) at the time had said that because of high cost of production, it would do nothing to reduce tariffs.
He recalled how in spite of all the calls by Ghanaians for a reduction, the then President John Mahama made it clear that given the circumstance he could not reduce tariffs.
“When the NPP assumed office, steps were taken and major announcements were made from 15 to 30 per cent tariffs reduction and households and industries rebate on tariffs,” he said.
As the major opposition party, Mr Afenyo-Markin, who is also the NPP MP for Efutu, said the NDC had failed to tell Ghanaians their policy alternatives and what they would do to make life better.
He argued how today the government had managed to keep lights on and ensured that in spite of major economies suffering from power outages, businesses and households in Ghana enjoyed regular supply of electricity.
“South Africa, Mr Speaker, is seeing dumsor and mighty Nigeria is also seeing dumsor but in Ghana today we are not experiencing dumsor,” he said.
Mr Afenyo-Markin described the President as being honest to tell Ghanaians bluntly the diverse challenges facing the country including the depreciation of the cedi, high inflation rate and debt exchanges becoming the language of everyday conversation.
“Nana Akufo-Addo was honest in outlining these issues because these are the concerns of the ordinary Ghanaian and he acknowledges these must come to an end and assured us that this government is making every effort to resolve,” he said.
Source: graphiconline
