Reject govts that fail to meet social contract — Bawumia
The Vice Presidential Candidate of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Alhaji Dr Mahamudu Bawumia,has opined that the ultimate measure of the success of every government is its ability to create jobs.
Advertisement
He has,therefore, challenged Ghanaians to judge every government by this yardstick.
In his view, Ghanaians must reject through the ballot box any government that failed to meet the basic social contract to prepare the enabling environment for job creation.
Dr Bawumia, who spoke on the theme: ‘’Effect of the Economy on Students’’ at the Methodist University College in Accra last Friday, said any massive infrastructure development as being touted by the government should reflect in economic growth and people’s pockets in the form of job creation.
Economic growth
He stated the decline in economic growth and hustle of graduates and youth not finding jobs rendered government’s claim of massive infrastructural development pointless since it had failed the country and the youth.
Dr Bawumia said an NPP-led government had as one of its topmost priority to invest in education and job creation when mandated by Ghanaians to serve them.
He said the NPP-led government would, therefore, grant tax credit schemes to businesses to employ fresh graduates from the public and private universities.
He said a future NPP government would also cut down on borrowing and provide incentive to the private sector to expand and employ more people.
Other Trending Stories
Tax exemption status
He assured the public that an NPP government would restore the tax exemption status of private universities by removing the 25 per cent corporate tax the NDC government had imposed on them.
The Vice Presidential Candidate said the tax had prevented private universities from expanding their infrastructure to enrol more students.
He,therefore, assured students who could not gain admission to public and private universities that an NPP government would grant charters to private people to establish universities in the country to supplement the efforts of the government to provide quality education.
Statistics
He explained that it was an enabling environment and not the imposition of excessive taxes that would spur private sector growth.
That was what happened during President Kufuor’s era when the private sector had access to capital and interest rates declined, with banks chasing individuals and businesses to come for loans and credit facilities.
He said businesses were able to offer graduates jobs,while many graduates opted to start their own businesses but today, it was the stark opposite as government borrowing had crowded out the ordinary people and businesses from getting loans.
He said the effects of the falling cedi and the absence of reliable power supply for the past four years had proved very costly to businesses.
He explained that if it took the government more than four years to fix one economic challenge such as dumsor, it would take more years to meet the challenge of providing jobs, which is more complex.
Corruption
Dr Bawumia said what was shocking in the country was not the massive corruption but the impunity with which it was being carried out and that an NPP government would establish an Independent Special Prosecutor to prosecute corrupt officials.