Mr Isaac Ashai Odamtten, Member of Parliament for Tema East Constituency on Monday said for Ghana to see significant development, the country needs to be consistent in its policy direction.
“When we look at countries that began with Ghana, Singapore, Korea and even in recent times, Dubai, we can see clearly that their progress is consistent, it is the lack of consistency in our development paradigm that is the bane of our under development,” he said.
He suggested that national development must be national and transcend political partisanship such that projects that have received national funding must be continued, completed and put to use for the benefit, well-being.
Mr Odamtten told the Ghana News Agency in an interview at Tema and lauded the efforts of past presidents in the fourth republic and that successive governments played their role in key sectors in Ghana’s development.
He said “the Late Former President Jerry John Rawlings emphasized on rural development and national electrification projects, these were laudable programmes that helped to stem the tide of rural-urban migration and also encourage small businesses and industries within our villages.”
He also said “former President John Agyekum Kufour focused on the needy even though they are pro-capital to the right, they came into the middle, we saw some interventions in social well-being of our people and a few road construction, the N1 is attributed to him and we cannot lose sight of that.”
Mr Odamtten attributed unity and peace to the Late Former President John Evans Atta Mills saying “It was in his time Municipal, Metropolitan and District Chief Executives of the opposing party were made to continue in office until new ones were elected and this was a government that had not promised anything around local government conducting elections but he did it.”
He said, “We’ ve seen many projects under Former President John Dramani Mahama, the E-blocks and new schools built and the new International Maritime hospital and Ridge hospital are of international standard.”
He said “we can all say that successive governments have made their contributions, but whether we’ve been consistent to ensure that Ghana becomes better, that is where we have a multi-million dollar question that remain unanswered.”
Mr Odamtten, who was once the Metropolitan Chief Executive of the Tema Metropolitan Assembly (TMA), was however convinced that though Ghana was moving in circles, it made some significant progress in some sectors.
“I believe to some extent with the assertion that Ghana is moving in circles, yes, we’ve seen some deterioration, but I can beat my chest and also say that we’ve made significant progress in some sectors, our situation must be better,” he said.