Charles Cardinal: Distrust of the Akufo-Addo government
There is widespread concern among the academia and popular commentators that citizens in Ghanaian democracy have grown increasingly distrustful, cynical of the Akufo-Addo government and our national governance and disillusioned with our democratic processes and principles.
The debate has hovered around the extent and depth of any legitimacy crisis along with interpretations of comparative trends. Nevertheless, the is a general belief among many that confidence in the New Patriotic Party (NPP) Government led by President Akufo-Addo and some sections of the media, has fallen steeply in Ghana.
For example, there was national backlash after government spent over GH¢25 billion to collapse about nine (9) banks in 2019 and rendered many unemployed with many feeling that Government was working too hard for the few family and cronies and not hard enough for the many. A classic wave of sentiment across the Ghanaian society, and a fall in trust in government.
Of late, the sentiment across the Ghanaian streets, President Nana Akuffo-Addo, is cracking down on media houses and jailing journalists perceived to be critical of his Government leading to a remarkable distrust of Government.
On crime and law, a survey conducted between September and October 2019 in Ghana, it was revealed that 52 percent of the respondents greatly did not trust the country’s court system. (Doris Dokua Sasu, September 20, 2021)
It is worth noting as worried the Minister of Security, Kan Dapaah once remarked, “if the interpretation of the law is so much tilted in our favour all the time, people will start accusing the judiciary and will not have confidence that they need”. This is how far the public has lost confidence in the Akuffo-Addo Government.
Any loss of political trust is widely believed to erode civic engagement and discourage conventional forms of political participation like voting turnout (Van Deth et al.2007; Dalton and Wattenberg 2000; Franklin 2004), to reduce support for progressive public policies (Hetherington 1998; 2005), and to fuel support for authoritarian – populist forces(Norris and Inglehart 2018)
On corruption, there are enormous case counts that the Akuffo-Addo Government has failed to deal decisively with. The loopholes in the Government purse are one reason why citizens widely ‘rejected’ Government’s e-levy policy seeking to tax the already impoverished Ghanaians. This is so because many believe Akuffo-Addo Government has been wasteful and can no longer entrust the resources into their hands.
The risks posed by this erosion of trust are believed to be most serious for the stability of our poorly institutionalized democratic regimes which are most vulnerable to backsliding.
The call and plead for citizens for trust in their government is conventionally a good thing, but that level of trust will ideally relate to the trustworthiness of the object of trust to whom our resources has been entrusted to.
As rational citizens, we will ideally ‘trust but verify’ by evaluating the trustworthiness such political actors and their procedural and policy performance.
My elders have maintained teaching children never to trust strangers. So next time when you meet such political object deceitfully acting on your interest and giving economic theories and promises just be careful of their trust.
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The author, Charles Cardinal, is a Youth activist in Trobu Constituency
Source: Ghana News
