Your Excellency; President Mahama
I trust that you and your family are great. I wish you Allah’s blessings as you struggle to put our country together. I am a stuanch member of the New Patriotic Party but I am a Ghanaian citizen first. This open letter must therefore be treated as one coming from a concerned citizen and not a disgruntled or disappointed NPP activist.
Your Excellency, I have been travelling around the country this few days. From up North to down south for various reasons. I do two things in my travelling. First, I work for NEAT (Not in Education, Apprenticeship or Training). We provide basic support for children who for financial reasons are unable to go to school, learn a trade and under go some kind of training or apprenticeship. I also work voluntarily for the NPP as an activist and campaigner. To infom you properly, I do not do both jobs simultaneously.
Travelling around the country has given me indepth knowledge and understanding about the country you head as President. Rural Ghana in particular appear to be cut off from the country. It is passive and hopeless. The citizens in the remotest part of our country are preoccupied with farming.
Their lives revolve around agriculture. It’s both recreation and employment for them. Unfortunately, these farmers are without basic support. The industry has virtually collapsed. Kofi Mensah is a farmer in Asore in the Effiduase District. Mr President, he tells me that, your government must redefine your policy on agriculture to save the sector.
Most of the basic schools are death traps. They are unsafe for habitation. In some schools, pupils study under very dangerous and unhygienic conditions.
The environment in most schools in our rural communities is totally unacceptable. There are no chairs and tables in the classrooms and the pupils sit on the bare floor to learn.
This makes teaching and learning extremely difficult. In Bindura, I was completely devastated to see children in torn uniforms and without any learning materials in a partially roofed, dilapidated structure as a place of learning. Teacher Zakari Zong narrated his ordeal and frustrations to me when I visited the school a fortnight ago.
He lamented strongly about the conditions of the school and blamed your government and your agents in the districts for neglecting the schools in the rural communities. Mr Zong described the situation in his school as criminal and asked for your personal intervention.
I have seen similar situations in Bongo, Nalerigu, Nadowli, Berekum, Prestea, etc. In all these places the challenges have been similar and the lamentations equal.
Teachers, nurses, and civil servants in the countryside are victims of your inefficiently run government. A teacher told me that, you (President Mahama) think the country is Accra and other major cities. He blames your administration for the poor management of the economy, pointing to the recent bailout your government secured from the IMF with such drastic conditions.
Mr President, everywhere, I have been I saw devastation and retrogression. I have heard the cries and lamentations of the citizens and it’s not looking good for you and our country in particular. Let me be blunt to you Mr President; the country is stalled.
My overall assessment is that the country has been managed poorly. Your government is not up and doing and your leadership style is being questioned by the people.
Finally, as a citizen, I am alarmed by the decline in the socio-economic lives of the citizens; especially in our rural communities and the manner the country is led and managed.
My heart bleeds that your government fails to commiserate with the ordinary person. Your failure to introduce a single pro-poor policy to ameliorate the suffering of the people beggars believe. Our current state as a country is catastrophic.
I am sad!
I had to openly communicate these observations to you because I am unable to see you personally to hand deliver my letter to you.
God bless our country.
Thank you.
Musah Superior
Citizen of Ghana.