Where has your ‘gbegbegbegbe’ economic talk gone? – JM jabs Bawumia: Says ‘economy’ no more in his ‘vocabulary’

Former President John Mahama has asked Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia “why the exchange rate is GHS17 to the dollar?”

This is just one of a series of questions that the flagbearer of the main opposition National Democratic Congress posed to his main rival in the 7 December 2024 presidential contest while campaigning in the Northern Region.

In Mr Mahama’s view, Dr Bawumia, the flagbearer of the incumbent New Patriotic Party, has shifted focus from his economic lectures to pursuing digitalisation initiatives.

To Mr Mahama, the shift reflects a shirking of Dr Bawumia’s duty as the head of the economic management team tasked with fixing the country’s ailing economy.

Mr Mahama observed that it is worrying for a vice president who was “gbegbegbegbe about the economy” to suddenly go quiet on major economic issues to the extent that today, he cannot even mention the word “economy”.

“It [economy] is not in his vocabulary,” Mr Mahama mocked, adding: “Anytime he opens his mouth, ‘digitalisation.’”

He, thus, posed the exchange rate question among others to Dr Bawumia and dared him to answer them just as he, as vice president, taunted his late opposite number, Kwesi Amissah-Arthur, with some 170 questions ahead of the 2020 elections.

“Why has Ghana’s debt risen from GHS120 billion to GHS767 billion in eight years? Why is inflation where it is? Why did it rise to 54 per cent under your administration for eight years? Why did you borrow GHS42 billion from the Bank of Ghana?” Mr Mahama listed.