Lives of Ghanaians have improved under the Akuffo-Addo led administration compared to Mahama’s era – Dr. Bawumia

The New Patriotic Party (NPP) flagbearer, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, has commended the Akufo-Addo led administration for its accomplishments, stating that the standard of living for Ghanaians has greatly improved in the last seven years when compared to the time under former President John Dramani Mahama.

Bawumia highlighted that despite recent economic difficulties, the current administration has significantly raised living standards under the Akuffo-Addo led administration, which stands in sharp contrast to the hardships of Mahama’s administration, which were typified by high tariffs and “dumsor” unemployment.

He recounted the hardships of the previous government, which included protracted blackouts, the removal of educational stipends, and the near-collapse of the healthcare system.

“There is no dispute about it. Why do I say so? Because the data says so! You would recall that during the previous government, we endured four years of power outages (which we called ‘dumsor’), which collapsed many businesses and increased unemployment,” Bawumia said.

“There was no chalk in schools, and teacher and nursing training allowances were cancelled. There was a near-collapse of the National Health Insurance Scheme and the National Ambulance Service. There were increase in electricity tariffs by an average of 50% annually. And many parents could not afford the fees to send their children to senior high school,” he added.

Additionally, he enumerated policies that allegedly produced more jobs than any other administration.

“Since coming into office, we have implemented many policies to reduce the suffering of Ghanaians. The electricity tariffs over the last six years have seen the lowest increase (11%) for any seven-year period over the last 30 years!

“We also provided free electricity for lifeline users for a year and a 50% reduction in tariffs for all other consumers during COVID-19. We have restored the cancelled teacher and nursing training allowances. We have created more jobs than any other government,” he claimed.

Bawumia also mentioned Ghana’s per capita income, which increased significantly from GH$7,756 in 2016 to GH$19,464 by the end of 2022, or from $1,978 to $2,353 in US dollars.

Beginning his national campaign tour last week, Dr. Bawumia visited the Eastern, Western, and Western North Regions to wrap up his first round of campaigning for the 2024 presidential election.