Presidential candidate of the New Patriotic Party NPP, Dr Mahamudu Bawumia, has challenged former president John Dramamni Mahama to an open debate.
He indicated that he was hopeful the NDC’s presidential candidate would have accepted to debate him one-on-one to address questions Mahama raised in the past few days. However, the former president has refused to accept the challenge.
Dr Bawumia’s comments come on the backdrop of some five questions former president Mahama asked him.
It would be recalled the flagbearer of the NPP then vice presidential candidate posed some 170 questions to the then Vice President Paa Kwesi Amissah-Arthur in the run up to the 2016 general elections. His questions focused on the economy and the measures the government of the day had put in place to reduce the hardship Ghanaians were going through. However, the 170 questions were unanswered by the late Vice president.
In the same vein, Mr. Mahama has urged Dr. Bawumia to display integrity and demonstrate responsibility by responding to his questions.
The NDC Flagbearer asked the questions while speaking to party supporters at Tatale in the Northern Region on Monday, October 28. Below are the five questions he asked Bawumia.
“Question 1, Why has the cedi deteriorated in value from Ghc 4 to $1 in 2016 to GH¢17 to a dollar today?
“Question 2, why has Ghana’s public debt risen from GH¢120 billion to GH¢767 billion with you as EMT Chair?
“Question 3, why did inflation rise to its highest in the 4th Republic of 54% under your watch as EMT Chair?
“Question 4, why did you borrow more than GH¢42 billion from the Bank of Ghana and caused the Central Bank to post its heaviest loss of Ghc60 bn?
“Question 5, Why have you run away from giving lectures on the economy? Why has the word ‘economy’ disappeared from your lexicon.”
“He should come and answer those four questions and explain to Ghanaians why we are where we are.
“The last question is why has he run away from the economy to digitalisation? He used to be talking a lot about the economy. Today he can’t mention the economy, it’s not in his vocabulary.
“Anytime he opens his mouth, digitalisation. Come and talk about the economy.
“That’s question five. Five questions. Tell him he should come and answer them,” he stated.
Responding to Mahama, Bawumia in a Facebook post noted that he thought Mr Mahama would be man enough to face him in a one-on-one debate for the Ghanaian public to assess their respective policies.
