President John Dramani Mahama has launched the 2016 blueprint of the National Democratic Congress with which he is seeking a re-election for a second term in Ghana’s December 7 elections.

Describing the document as “the best plan to move Ghana forward,” President Mahama said the NDC is the only party that can deliver on the aspirations of Ghanaians and move the country forward in the next four years.

Mr Mahama said the NDC is ever poised in its transformational agenda which has been captured in the 2016 manifesto in four thematic areas

“We’ve achieved feats that only a few years ago were considered insurmountable,” President Mahama said, promising a more growth of the economy that would produce thousands of jobs in the coming years.

Highlights of President Mahama’s address

– We’ve made it possible for unprecedented access to education at all levels through massive investment in expansion of school infrastructure while enhancing welfare packages in that sector.

– We have in the last few years, transformed healthcare delivery in the country; infants under five child and maternal mortalities are all under decline, mother to child transmission of HIV is also going down. We’ve made Ghana free of the Guinea worm disease

– Ghana has strong and dedicated human resources both in the education and health sectors and we remain eternally grateful for their efforts over the years.

– I wish to salute organise labour and the working people of Ghana. We appreciate your hard work and I promise you even better years ahead as our economy continues to grow from strength to strength

– Today, over three-quarters of our population has access to clean water, today more than 82 per cent of our population have access to electric power. Many of our roads have gotten better following the most massive road construction programmes in our nation’s history.

– Our transport system continues to modernise while our housing programme has delivered more public housing than previous governments.

– The Communications sector is booming thanks to the reforms we’ve embarked upon.

– We have achieved all these while taking bold steps to correct fiscal slippages, which threatened to unhinge our development efforts.

– With high budget deficits rising inflation, dwindling revenue occasioned by very low donor inflows, volatility on the world economic front and instability on the foreign exchange market, there was the need to implement bold, fiscal monitoring measures to put the economy on a more stable path.

– Today, the budget deficit has been cut from as high of 11.8% in 2012 to 6.3% in 2015 and it is projected to be 4.9% by the end of this year.

– We are on course to bringing  inflation down to single digit by next year. Our own projection and  those from financial institutions show that Ghana’s economy is going to grow above eight percent next year

– It must be placed on record, however, that averagely, this economy has grown in higher quantum in the last 8 years than it did in the 8 years between 2001 and 2008.

– The growth has also been associated with job opportunities such as over 400,000 jobs created through our investment in public works and several other thousands of jobs created through the revival of defunct factories and the establishment  of new ones.

– There are even better job opportunities coming up over the next four years. My government has been candid and transparent with the people of Ghana.

– We have applied the most potent disinfectant in fighting corruption, which is exposure sunlight; that is the sunlight policy to exposure corruption.

– Unlike previous governments, we have not declared that we will not expose corruption and bring down our government.

– We will expose corruption wherever we find it. And we’ve also investigated and where necessary, we have commenced prosecution of persons who have indulge in corruption.

– We’ll make corruption a high risk activity.

By Stephen Kwabena Effah|3news.com|Ghana
Twitter @steviekgh_TV3