One of the very powerful Chief of Staffs to have manned the Presidency of Ghana, is demanding the resignation of Ken Ofori-Atta, insisting that his continuous stay in office as the Minister of Finance and Economic Planning, is a demonstration of a character that lacks principles.
Kwadwo Okyere Mpiani, the man, who for years defined the good, the bad and the ugly sides of the John Agyekum Kufuor administration, stated that he would have tendered in his resignation, if he was in the position of Mr Ofori-Atta, saying he is unfit to continue in the role.
He also wants President Akufo-Addo, to listen to the concerns of Ghanaians more and more to find what their needs are.
He charged “Honestly, If I were the Finance Minister (Ken Ofori-Atta), this is not a question of the President dropping me, from my utterances and then what is happening, I would just say Mr. President, thank you so much, I think it’s time for me to sit back for another person to take over.”
“But I am not going to tell any President to drop the Finance Minister or any Minister. That should be left to the President,” he said yesterday.
According to Mr Mpiani, such a decision would have been made on a matter of principle, following the decision by the government to seek economic support from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) citing some utterances made by the finance minister, prior to the decision to approach the IMF to back his position.
Speaking on JoyNews, Mr Mpiani, said he is concerned about the performance of some of the Ministers but conceded that a reshuffle is the sole prerogative of the President.
Mr Ofori-Atta, in February this year, was emphatic during a media interaction stating that, the government had no intention to go to the IMF for a bailout but will resort to homegrown policies to generate revenue.
The turnaround by the government to commence engagements with the IMF for economic support has had the government being heavily criticised.
This has led to several calls for the head of the minister for finance while others have made calls for the president to reshuffle his appointees.
According to Kwadwo Mpiani, he is concerned about the performance of some of President Akufo-Addo’s appointees but maintained that a decision to reshuffle ministers remains a sole prerogative of the president.
He, however, pointed out that, he would urge President Akufo-Addo, to sack ministers who are not delivering, if he was offered the opportunity to advise him.
“It’s the prerogative of the President, if he believes that all these people are working well, fine. But a listening President will try and find out what the people think…,” he said.
“I would advise him to drop some of the Ministers and bring in some [new ones]” he added.
Mr Mpiani, noted that if he had the chance to advise the President, he would ask him to drop some inefficient Ministers for their poor performance.
“I believe if you ask Ghanaians they will be able to tell you that this Minister A or Minister B must go because we do not see the effectiveness of such a Minister. So it concerns me and I believe it is something which must be done but is the prerogative of the President,” he added.
