Can the president-elect live up to Ghana’s high expectations?

Former Ghanaian President John Mahama won last month’s election in a landslide, but he will be under immense pressure to live up to voters’ expectations when he takes office on Tuesday.

After more than three years of economic misery, Ghanaians want a quick solution.

Mahama returned to power after eight years in opposition with what political analyst Nansata Yakubu called a “masterclass” in campaigning.

He defeated Vice President Mahamuda Bawumia with 56.6% of the vote to 41.6% for the biggest margin of a candidate in 24 years.

Mahama’s party, the National Democratic Congress (NDC), also managed to secure an overwhelming majority in parliament, securing 183 of the 276 seats.

They are one seat short of the two-thirds majority needed to pass laws and approve budgets and contracts without a vote from MPs on the other side of the political divide.

The result for one deputy mandate has not yet been announced due to discrepancies. Four other seats are contested in the NDC court.

But voter turnout was lower than in the 2020 election, especially in some centers of Bawumia’s New Patriotic Party (NPP), suggesting some people there – disillusioned with her performance in government – stayed home.

As Mahama’s supporters celebrated his victory, Belinda Amuzu – a teacher in the northern city of Tamale, a Mahama stronghold – summed up their hopes.

“I expect the new government to change the economy so that the difficulties disappear. He should also prosecute corrupt officials so that it will be a lesson to others,” she told the BBC.

“Hardship” became a common phrase in Ghana after the economy bottomed out in 2022, leading to a cost-of-living crisis that undermined Bawumia’s reputation as a “baby economist” and led to his hands down defeat. Mahama.

However, during his State of the Nation Address on Friday, outgoing President Nana Akufa Addo said he is leaving behind a rebuilt economy.

“We are handing a country with gross international reserves of almost $8bn (£6.4bn). This is more than the $6.2 billion my administration received in 2017,” he said.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has committed about $1.9 billion to support the country’s economic recovery after Ghana signed up to the program in 2022.

However, opposition MPs do not agree with Akufo Addo’s assessment.

“The people of Ghana have already given their verdict on the true state of the nation and that verdict was very clear. Economic difficulties, huge debt, high youth unemployment, hopelessness and many more,” said Minority Member of Parliament Emmanuel Armagh Kofi Boa.

Ghanaian economist Professor Godfred Bokpin told the BBC that the challenges facing the next government are huge.

“What Ghana needs now is credible leadership, a lean government and efficient public service delivery. Without that, there can be no future,” he said.

Mahama promised to reduce the size of the cabinet from over 80 to about 60, but Prof Bokpin argued it should be even smaller, while political analyst Dr Kwame Asah-Asante stressed the need for appointments based on merit rather than loyalty.

Mahama will be accompanied by former Minister of Education, Naana Jane Opoku-Agyemang, who is set to become Ghana’s first female Vice President.

Dr Yakubu said her appointment was not “symbolism” and she was not someone who could be “manipulated”.

“We have a fantastic first female Vice President in Professor Naana Jane Opoku-Agyemang,” she said BBC Focus on Africa podcast.

Mahama served his first four-year term as president after winning in 2012, but lost his re-election bid in 2016 when Nana Akufa-Addo came to power and Bawumia was his running mate.

Dr. Yakubu said Mahama contested the 2016 election based on his track record of building roads, schools and hospitals, but voters rejected him because their mantra then was, “We don’t eat infrastructure.”

But, she said, during the Covid pandemic, voters appreciated the infrastructure his government had built, especially hospitals.

This – along with the fact that the economy has plunged into deep crisis under the current government, forcing it to turn to the IMF for a $3bn (£2.4bn) bailout – led to Mahama’s re-election, Dr Yakubu added.

She told the BBC that Mahama must now fulfill his campaign promise to create jobs to reduce the unemployment rate of almost 15% and ease the cost of living crisis by abolishing some taxes – or what Ghanaians call “nuisance taxes”.

Mahama has promised to make Ghana a “24-hour economy” through the creation of night jobs in both the public and private sectors. He said he would give businesses tax breaks to stay open at night and reduce their electricity prices.

But his critics are skeptical, pointing out that Ghana was plunged into its worst electricity crisis during his first term, with power outages so severe that Mahama joked at the time that he was known as ‘Mr Damsar’ – ” dum” means “off”. and “sor” means “on” in the local Twi language.

He has promised to scrap several taxes – including the much-criticized electronic levy on mobile transactions and a levy on carbon dioxide emissions generated by petrol and diesel-powered cars.

Prof Bokpin said he doubted the Mahama administration would be able to deliver on its promises.

“They didn’t do a cost-benefit analysis. There’s no way in the budget to turn those promises into reality,” he said.

Professor Bokin believes that full economic recovery and growth will take a long time.

He said: “When you talk about economic transformation and inclusive productivity growth, you have probably 15 years or more of consistently doing the right things.

“In Ghana, we cannot do the right thing consistently for a long time. We do the right thing between elections, and then we screw up.”

But Mahama is confident of proving his critics wrong, saying he intends to renegotiate the terms of the IMF loan to free up money for “social intervention programmes” in a country where 7.3 million people live in poverty.

In an interview before the election, Mahama told the BBC that the IMF wanted “some balance” in public finances.

“If you can reduce spending and you can increase revenue and increase the non-tax revenue that comes in, you can create a balance sheet,” he said.

Dr. Asah-Asante said Mahama’s experience as a former president would help him navigate Ghana in turbulent waters.

“Of course, he will probably face difficulties, but he has what it takes to turn things around,” the analyst added.

Apart from the economy, corruption is one of the biggest problems facing Ghana, but not everyone is convinced that Mahama will be able to deal with the scourge.

Mahama’s previous stints in government – as vice president and president – have been accused of corruption, although he has consistently denied any wrongdoing.

In 2020, a UK court found that aviation giant Airbus used bribes to secure military aircraft contracts with Ghana between 2009 and 2015.

An investigation was then launched in Ghana, but the special prosecutor’s office, in a decision announced months before the election, concluded that there was no evidence that Mahama himself was involved in corrupt activities.

The outgoing government has also been accused of corruption, including the purchase of spare parts for ambulances worth $34.9 million and the controversial national cathedral project, on which $58 million was spent with no progress on its construction.

Mahama has promised that his government will fight corruption and ensure that officials are held accountable for wrongdoing.

“We are thinking about special courts,” he told the BBC.

Mahama has already organized so-called Operation Return All Lost (Oral) to investigate public funds and assets believed to have been stolen by outgoing government officials.

Dr Asah-Asante said Mahama should demand financial accountability from the outgoing government during the handover phase so that “whatever went wrong, he can fix” once his government takes office next month.

The analyst added that Mahama, who will be inaugurated on Tuesday As President Akufa-Addo steps down after two terms in office, he has no choice but to live up to the expectations of Ghanaians – or they will “punish his government the way they punished the nuclear power plant”.

Mahama succinctly acknowledged this in his victory speech, saying: “The expectations of Ghanaians are very high and we cannot afford to disappoint them.

“Our best days are not behind us; our best days are ahead. Always forward – never backward.”