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President John Mahama has ridiculed Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo's  “one-village-one-dam” campaign promise describing it as a mark of ignorance and hopelessness on the part of the New Patriotic Party  (NPP ) presidential candidate.
 
Saying that Nana Akufo-Addo "does not know what he is talking about," the President revealed that the dams which Nana Akufo-Addo had promised the people of the north are dugout dams.

Speaking at the inauguration of the Kanjarga Community Day Senior High School  (SHS ) in the Builsa South District of the  Upper East Region Tuesday,  the President said, "When we ( NDC) talk of dams, we talk of real irrigation dams and not the dugout dams somebody is talking about."

He, therefore, urged the people of the north especially farmers not buy into Nana Akufo-Addo's  promise as it was only meant to win their votes

"There is a confusion in the minds of some people about what a dam is. And so when somebody says one village one dam, he really doesn’t know what he is talking about," Mahama said of his main contender in the December 7 presidential election.

Explaining, he said,  “Most of the time they are referring to the small dugouts we have that are used mostly for livestock watering. These dugouts do not have a water source. They are normally fed by rainfall during the raining season and then in the dry season; they hold the water so that the animals can get water to drink until the next raining season starts."

Taking a look at what he called viable dams, President Mahama said, "The dams that are viable that we use for irrigation normally are generated from a stream or a small river and what you do is you build a dam across it and hold back the water so that they are able to hold enough water for irrigation and dry season farming and not all village has that kind of water sourceand so you cannot say you are building a dam in every single village.”

SADA already working on dams

President Mahama said the Savanna Accelerated Development Authority  (SADA) had already embarked on a programme to provide irrigation dams in the Savanna belt.

“SADA is embarking on the provision of irrigation dams all over the Savanna parts of the country. They have done a study of all the prominent water sources and for those that are viable, we are going to barrage dams across them so that we hold back the water during the dry season for dry season gathering,” the President said.

NDC has best programmes

Earlier on Monday , President Mahama had adressing a rally at Garu where he said the NDC had the best programmes to advance agriculture in the north.

He said the Tamne Dam project , which was be cht sod for work to negin a couplecof months ago, would be completed to bring relief to farmers.

Water from the dam is expected to irrigate about 3,250 acres of land and promote an all-year-round farming.

It is expected that about 5,400 direct and indirect jobs would be created following the construction of the dam. It would boost farming activities in the Bawku Municipality,  the Garu-Tempane, Binduri and Pusiga districts.

President Mahama  assured the people that work on the Bolgatanga - Bawku road which had been awarded on contract would be pursued to its logical conclusion.

"It is going to be a first class road," the President told the people.