The National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE) has appealed to leadership and the citizenry to be sensitive enough in the fight against corruption-related issues to avoid political instability.
It cautioned that there was a direct relationship between corruption, its effect on democracy and the imminent danger ahead to create political instability which must be prevented.
“Ghana stagnated in its performance on the corruption perception index, where the country managed to rake 43 points out of the 100 score mark, just as it did last year and the surge in political turbulence in the sub-region has occasioned the government’s inability to address the root cause of corruption,” the Commission said.
Josephine Nkrumah, Chairperson of NCCE, made the appeal whenshe was contributing to a roundtable discussion on the theme: ‘Rethinking Ghana’s Anti-Corruption Strategies, A Decade Trend Analysis of the Corruption Perception Index in Ghana’ which was organised by the Ghana Integrity Initiative (GII).
She urged the government to walk the talk in its quest in dealing with corruption becausethere were fears of political instability “if appropriate measures are not implemented to deal with corruption in the country and the surge in political turbulence in the sub-region must occasion the government’s ability to address root causes of corruption.
“If the fundamental law is flawed and it does not serve the purpose now, then we have to go back to the drawing board to implement measures to make corruption-related issues unattractive,” Ms Nkrumah stressed.
She observed that coming into power through violence should not be perceived as democratic however, there was direct relationship between corruption, its effect on democracy and imminent danger that lies ahead for the nation and leadership and citizens must be sensitive enough to fight the canker.
“Let me remind all of us about what is going on in the sub-region, we see recurrence of coups in West Africa and must not sit and think it cannot happen in Ghana and all the countries we have seen who are suffering coup d’état, you know the frightening thing about it is the coup leaders are being cheered by the people.
“And so we ask ourselves, what then is democracy? For the people and by the people so if a coup leader comes and is cheered on, is it democracy? Is it democratic?” Ms Nkrumah quizzed. –myjoyonline.com
