Director of the Centre for European Studies of the University of Ghana, Professor Ransford Gyampo has advised political parties to be moderate in the number of campaign promises they make so as to ensure effective delivery.
According Prof. Ransford Gyampo, political parties have typically made numerous campaign promises to entice electorates for votes. History, he stated, has however established that no political party has been able to fulfill all of its campaign promises. He is therefore urging political parties to make a moderate number of promises that they can efficiently deliver on if given the mandate.
Commenting on his assessment of the NDC’s manifesto for the 2020 elections, Prof. Ransford Gyampo asserted that both the National Democratic Congress and the New Patriotic Party have made outrageous number of promises that they will not be able to fulfill should any of them be elected in the December polls.
“On content, I again have a challenge, just as I had with the NPP’s. As usual and typical of political parties, they promise all that can be promised. But the history of Ghana’s Fourth Republic show that no political party is able to do all the things it promises in its manifesto,” he stated in a social media post.
He believes political parties, if given the mandate, will be able to effectively implement projects and policies that will lead to the improvement of the quality of lives of the people provided they make and focus on a few number of problem-solving campaign promises.
He stated that “Rather than resorting to the over-flogged strategy of promising everything, knowing that not all can be done or done well, I am of the view that, we will properly be served with quality projects, that properly improves the quality of human life, if political parties focus on few projects, and deliver effectively on them, rather than focusing on everything and pussyfooting their implementation in a manner that sacrifices quality.”
This is contained in his critique of the NDC’s ‘People’s Manifesto’ which was launched on September 7, 2020 at UPSA in Accra.
The NDC promised among others in its 2020 manifesto to institute free primary healthcare policy for all Ghanaians, free tertiary education for people with disabilities and create jobs for the teaming youth in country.
Professor Ransford Gyampo commended the NDC on the approach it adopted in drafting its manifesto stating that the manifesto “breeds ownership, enhances knowledge and deepens accountability.”
The governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) first launched its manifesto on Saturday, August 22 under the theme “leadership of service, protecting our progress, transforming Ghana for all.”
The party said its 2020 manifesto is geared towards consolidating the gains the government of party has made over the last three years.
It promised among others to abolish the guarantor system for students seeking loans, expanding excess to legal education and construct airport in the Central Region.
