Akufo-Addo’s hands were tied. The economy choked. And history lied.
Suddenly, many Ghanaians are pretending not to remember what actually happened between 2020 and 2024. If this is not forgetfulness, then it is deliberate dishonesty.
Akufo-Addo’s second term was not easy. It was bruising. But it was not because he failed to govern. It was because he was deliberately prevented from governing.
After the December 7, 2020 elections, the NDC found itself stuck with a president they hated and could not remove. Akufo-Addo had already beaten John Mahama once in one of the most humiliating defeats ever suffered by a sitting president. That bitterness did not disappear in 2020. It hardened.
Parliament was hung. The NDC seized the opportunity. They pushed through Alban Bagbin as Speaker, not for national balance, but for control. From that moment, Parliament stopped being a place for lawmaking and became a tool for sabotage.
Speaker Bagbin did not only wear his NDC instincts to frustrate Akufo-Addo’s administration; he became a clear daylight wizard. Financial approvals were blocked. Budgets were delayed. Economic instruments that were standard, necessary, and urgent were shot down. These were not technical disagreements. They were political decisions designed to choke the government.
Akufo-Addo still tried to govern. He negotiated. He compromised. He tolerated humiliation in the hope that consensus would keep the economy alive. But the NDC had no interest in consensus. Their plan was obvious: frustrate the government, break the economy, and return John Mahama, their Bole darling to power in 2024.
Mahama was not passive either. He coordinated from outside, using allies in Parliament to kill any policy or financial intervention that could stabilise the economy or give the government breathing space. When they suspected their frontline of playing some consensus with the government, they removed Hon. Haruna and Muntaka immediately.
The Supreme Court therefore became the last line of restraint. And this was where Chief Justice Gertrude Torkornoo attracted enemies that later led to her career assassination when John Mahama eventually became president. Her problems did not begin with incompetence; they began with courage, and the national interest.
Now, take all this seriously and without emotion. No propaganda. No libilibi.
Under these conditions, Akufo-Addo’s second term was not a failure. It was a government operating under siege. And the fact that Ghana did not collapse is itself evidence of competent leadership.
People must stop pretending that 2020 to 2024 was normal governance. It was not. It was organised obstruction.
If this context is uncomfortable, too bad. History does not exist to make anyone feel good.
J. A. Sarbah
