Last week, the Minister of Health, Dr. Kweku Agyeman Manu, for the first time broke his silence on the controversial Sputnik V contract, when he granted an interview to AdomFM.
While the Minister spoke on a wide range of topics, of particular interest to this newspaper and all well-meaning and patriotic Ghanaians, was his responses to issue relating to the Sputnik V contract.
The interview availed Ghanaians the opportunity to gauge the mind of the minister and by extension the government.
It was good for the minister to open up on the issue after more than seven months since the incidence, but for him to turn around to accuse Ghanaians of not understanding the story, in what was clearly an error of judgment on his part, cannot be left without telling him to keep quiet as we have moved on.
According to him “When the issue of Sputnik-V came up, in fact, there was a decision to go in for more vaccines because there was scarcity of vaccines as many countries had closed their borders.
“What encouraged us to buy those vaccines was that the same vaccine was sold at $38 elsewhere, so considering that, we thought it was cheap,” he explained on Adom FM’s Burning Issues.
This newspaper refuses to accept the whimsical explanation that, the decision was taken to save Ghanaians. It goes beyond that and is traceable to a willful inclination to do wrong in the belief that president Akufo-Addo, will protect him from the long arm of justice.
Agyeman Manu’s response on the Sputnik V issue shows he has no remorse and will take the same decision, if given the opportunity again.
As a newspaper, we had aligned with the majority of Ghanaians who at the time called for his resignation or be sacked by the president and still believe if Ghana was a sane country, he will not be at post.
If the President Akufo-Addo, who made a joke out of the concerns of Ghanaians for him to sack the minister, then Ghanaians will just have to wait for another administration for a way forward on the matter.
The minister, who was once Chairman of the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament,ought to know better, but as usual the issue has been swept under the carpet
