Mahama Will Win By 52%....IMANI

Policy think-tank IMANI Ghana says President John Mahama performed fairly in delivering on the NDC's 2012 manifesto, themed 'Advancing the Better Ghana Agenda'.


With 61 days to the December general elections, IMANI says the Mahama administration was able to achieve 52.9% of its 540 promises contained in the manifesto which is based on four themes the economy, governance, education, social policy and infrastructure.

The NDC's own assesment, the government party has been able to implement at least 80% of its policy document, the Director of Research of the party, Dr William Ahadzie has said.

But presenting its report at the Coconut Groove Hotel in Accra, IMANI believes about half of the 540 promises were implemented. The think-tank said its work only focused on the documented promises. It does not measure the impact of the implemented pledges. Explaining its methodology, the IMANI Assessment Team (IAT) assigned 25% weight to Governance, 25% weight to Economy, 15% to Human Capital Investment, 15% to Social Policy, and 20% to Infrastructural Development.

Government's best performance was found under education where it scored 69.4% indicating a good performance. Government over the past four years has invested GHC28billion in education.

The NDC pledged in 2012 to improve education by improving early childhood development; primary, secondary and tertiary education; distance education, science and technology education; vocational and technical education.

IMANI assessed that access to education has improved greatly under president Mahama. The government's flagship educational policies included the conversion of polytechnics to technical universities and the establishment of 200 Community Day Senior High Schools.

But President Mahama's government was weakest in its implementation of promises under the economy where it scored 43.9%.

NDC government pledged in 2012 to maintain a GDP growth of at least 8% per annum; maintain a single digit inflation rate; reduce fiscal deficit to 5% of GDP; increase per capita income from about $1600 to $2300 by 2017; and improve the international reserve to four months of import cover;
The December 2012 inflation of 8.8 percent marked 31 consecutive months of single-digit inflation in the country. 

Apart from 2012 when GDP grew by 8%, the economic growth has been lackluster, hovering around 3.5%. Government has also only been able to maintain a maximum of three months import cover over the four years.

On the theme of infrastructure, the government scored 55%. President Mahama has said his government's GHC 3billion sunk in infrastructure represents 'the most massive infrastructural development in the history of this country'.

On Governance-based promises, President Mahama scored 50.7%. Weighing the government's implementation of its social policy promises, IMANI scored the government 52.2%.

Ending the presentation, IMANI said it is left to Ghanaians to judge what a 52.9% performance rate means to their lives. The think-tank said if Ghanaians feel a disconnect between the output of government and their lives, it could mean that the promises were not based on their needs.