Bus Branding Saga: 'Political Quantity Surveyors' Would Have Saved Us Money

It is rather unfortunate that President John Dramani Mahama continues to insinuate that no one is fit in this country to question anything he and others in his administration do.

We cannot begrudge the President his privilege position as the leader of the country, and as such the one with the power to oversee every public spending on our behalf. But, it is important that the President recognises and respects our constitutional right as citizens of this country to demand accountability regarding his stewardship.

My 'short memory" (as the President believes all of us Ghanaians have short memory) notwithstanding, I remember how, in the first few days of his presidency, the President tagged arguments raised concerning where his predecessor the late Prof John Evans Atta Mills was to be buried as 'senseless'.

I remember, too, that common sense prevailed in the end, and the decision reached was not exactly the decision the President had sought to impose on us. One would have thought that the incident would have made the President realise that his judgement would not always pass the litmus test as perfect. But no, the President continues to hold his views supreme and everyone else's either 'senseless' or inconsequential.  

It is not very long when he said we should all wait until we are able to rise to the high office of the President to question his decisions.  In spite of the popular view of the majority of Ghanaians that the President's remark was distasteful and unbecoming of the first gentleman of the land, the President would continue to ignore the concerns and sentiments of the populace. Such that during a sod cutting ceremony at Kasoa to commission the construction of the Kasoa interchange the President is reported to have said that ' ...when you have a new breed of political quantity surveyors, who can just stand and look at something and say it’s too expensive then you have a problem.'

By inference the President was once again suggesting that unless one was in his government or was a quantity surveyor he recognises, one should not even think of demanding value for money concerning projects being carried out by his government. Certainly this is very unfortunate, particularly when the President himself acknowledges that his government have credibility issues, which was why they had to bring in the IMF to shore up the little left of that. The truth is, the President and his administration almost always get it wrong and in lots of cases his critics whom he never ceases to denegrate get it spot on. It would be recalled, that it did not take branding experts to point out that spending as much as GH¢3.6m in branding 116 buses was not only outrageous but absurd.

Sadly neither President Mahama nor any of the members of his administration saw anything wrong with this until some of the very people he is calling 'political quantity surveyors' today raised eyebrows. It is also a fact that it did not take former Presidents nor experts in youth development to point out that the nation was leaking money when fund under the direct supervison of the Presidency was being syphoned left, right and centre in the name of GYEEDA, SADA, SUBA, etc projects.

If you ask me, I think those the President is calling 'political quantity surveyors' would have saved us millions of cedis in all of these instances. Clearly the President and his administration so far have failed the value for money test and should therefore allow the 'political quantity surveyors' and whatever else he chooses to call his critics continue to do the necessary monitoring for us as best they could. We do need them.

Source: Asare Adei