REJOINDER: Stop the Lazy Blame Game — Ken Ofori-Atta Did Not Bring Ghana to Its Knees Alone

By Citizen Kofi Adu-Baah

Let’s get something straight — Ghana didn’t collapse because of one man. The economy didn’t sink because Ken Ofori-Atta woke up every morning plotting how to ruin a country. This idea that Ghana’s entire economic struggle was caused by one Finance Minister is not just lazy — it’s dishonest.
The article titled “Ken Ofori-Atta: The Finance Minister Who Brought NPP & Ghana to Its Knees” is full of passion, I’ll admit. But passion is not analysis. Anger is not accuracy. And storytelling, no matter how dramatic, is not truth. What that piece did was take a complicated, global economic moment — mix it with political frustration — and pin the entire mess on one man. That’s not journalism. That’s a witch hunt in prose.
Yes, Ken made mistakes. Nobody is denying that. But governance is not a solo sport. This is not a one-man band. There was a Cabinet. There was Parliament. There were sector ministers. And above all, there was a President. The same budgets Ken presented — who reviewed and approved them? Cabinet. Who passed them? Parliament. Who executed them? MDAs and MMDAs. Let’s not act like Ken jumped over all these people, locked himself in a room and ran the economy with a magic pen.
The Economic Management Team? That too is being oversold. The EMT is advisory — not executive. It’s not a command centre. You can’t pretend the EMT is some economic court with binding powers. The same EMT that Dr. Bawumia chaired — were we expecting him to veto Ken’s budgets? Be serious. If EMT advice wasn’t fully taken, that’s a governance discussion, not evidence of dictatorship.
And please — can we stop this narrative that Dr. Bawumia “ran away” from economic issues? Bawumia didn’t run. He rolled up his sleeves and focused on building Ghana’s digital backbone — something that may be the single most important economic reform we’ve seen since the 90s. Ghana Card integration. Mobile money interoperability. E-property address system. Digital port systems. ICUMS. These are real tools that will serve generations. He also led the Gold for Oil Programme, which stabilized the freefalling cedi in 2022 when even Bank of Ghana had run out of steam. This wasn’t “retreat” — it was leadership in another form.
Now, to the economic mess itself. Was it bad? Yes. Were people suffering? Absolutely. But was Ghana the only country in trouble? No. Let’s not cherry-pick memory. Over 60 countries went to the IMF between 2020 and 2023. Even the UK — yes, the almighty UK — had the pound crash and inflation go wild. Ghana’s economy was hammered by COVID-19, which shut down borders, killed revenue, and triggered emergency spending. Add the Russia-Ukraine war, which jacked up fuel and food prices, and you have the perfect economic storm.
Ken Ofori-Atta wasn’t borrowing because he wanted to. He was borrowing because schools still had to run. Health workers still had to be paid. Free SHS still had to function. Road projects had to continue. And when he proposed cuts, people screamed. So which one should he have done? Abandon projects or borrow? Governance is not slogans — it’s choices under pressure.
And this is where we must be brutally honest with ourselves. Yes Ken was a problem …but so were people like Bumpty, Gabby, Bediatuo, &  Frema plus a lot of rude and incompetent but long serving CEOs and “suddenly ” 2×4 ministers like Abu Jinapor… As for The NIB and national security coordinators appointed after 2020; the least said about them the better. They have to be the most incompetent security appointments in the history of Ghana.

Every Government is ultimately undone not simply by its policies but by how they execute those policies. The NPP had some excellent policies but when it comes to strategy or policy, it can look great on paper or when spoken about. However…to execute it? It takes a painstakingly selected competent team to ensure proper execution. In the end