Mr Adams Fushieni, the Africa Parliamentary Capacity Development Officer of the Natural Resource Governance Institute (NRGI), a non-governmental organisation, has advised the electorate to vote on merit in the December 7 polls to facilitate national development.
He said partisan politics remained the bane of national development and until the electorate changed their mindset and voted on merit the country would not experience any meaningful development.
Mr Fushieni gave the advice when he spoke at the opening session of a national training course on oil, gas and mining for selected journalists in Accra.
The 14-day course core (B) is a follow-up to the regional training course core “A” which was held in Tanzania for 24 African journalists selected from Ghana, Tanzania and Uganda from October 16-29, this year.
Being organised by the NRGI, in collaboration with Penplusbytes, the International Institute of ICT Journalism, the training programmes are aimed at empowering participants to tell the true story in the extractive sector.
Mr Fushieni expressed discomfort that the two major political parties - the National Democratic Congress (NDC) and New Patriotic Party (NPP) had no concrete policy direction to facilitate accelerated national development.
“This is because they know that the electorates would definitely vote on political party lines,” he said, and called for a long term development plan that would provide a pathway to sustainable development.
Mr Kwami Ahiabenu II, the Executive Director of Penplusbytes, said strong comparative analysis between Ghana, Uganda and Tanzania in the extractive industry would help the countries to shape their fiscal regimes, regulations, policy guidelines and local content provisions especially in the oil and gas sector.
<<Print>>