The Ghana Centre for Democratic Development (CDD-Ghana) has said attacks on its recent survey that indicated seven out of every 10 Ghanaians think the country is headed in the wrong direction are unfortunate because the views are a reflection of what Ghanaians think.
On Tuesday August 9, a senior research fellow at CDD-Ghana, Daniel Armah Attoh, addressing journalists in Accra on the survey, said: “Ghanaians place unemployment, electricity, and education on the top policy priority list they want the 2016 polls to address, and yet, a clear majority assess government’s performance in addressing their policy priorities negatively.”
He added: “…The mood of the electorate going into the 2016 polls is broadly negative. Seven in 10 Ghanaians believe that the country is going in the wrong direction and nearly half blame this completely on mostly the government. Nonetheless, Ghanaians are split in their evaluation of the job performance of the president and Members of Parliament. Nearly half approve the overall job performance of the president and their respective MPs, but the rest disapprove.”
Soon after the CDD launched the report, a Deputy General Secretary of the governing National Democratic Congress (NDC), Koku Anyidoho, said the pre-election survey was “something that the NPP cooked and they have put out”.
“It still remains a fact that the CDD, as far as we are concerned, is an appendage of the NPP,” Mr Anyidoho stated.
However, responding to this reaction from the NDC, a senior research fellow at the CDD, Dr Kojo Asante, said: “It is unfortunate to hear this again. CDD is 18 years now as an organisation. We have been doing this work for many years, and we’re respected all over and this is not the first time we’ve done surveys. We have people who are very experienced in doing surveys. Our samples are open and these are the national representative sample of Ghanaians and these are their views.
“We are 22 years practising democracy, and we still can’t get used to pre-election surveys. This is done all over the world and governments look at these things that are done by independent organisations and take from it what they can, but for us the objective is to generate discussions around the main issues that should concern any political party seeking to govern this nation. And I think that will help us shift from these personality attacks. That really does not address the bread-and-butter issues for Ghanaians,” Dr Asante told Citi News.
Source: Ghana/AccraFM.com
