Let law on financial loss to the state stay | NDC Chairman

The law on wilfully causing financial loss to the state should stay as it is and must not be repealed or amended, the Chairman of the Odododiodoo Constituency of the NDC, Mr Daniel Nii Okai, has stated. Speaking to the Ghana News Agency (GNA) in Accra on Sunday, he supported the call by the NDC flag bearer, Prof John Evans Atta Mills, that the law must stay and should not be touched when some people had already been jailed under it. "My mind tells me that they are sensing danger that they are not going to win the 2008 elections. Most of them have mismanaged public and state funds as the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of Parliament has revealed". "They are afraid that when they are out of government the law may be used against them and are trying to play it in a way to have a safe haven when they had used the same law to imprison officials and functionaries of the NDC when they took over," Mr Okai said. The Odododiodoo NDC Chairman noted that even though the law was passed when the Party was in power, it never used it but only remained the statute books. He pointed out that just after assuming office in the year 2000, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) government, "went into the archives" to look for the law to put functionaries of the NDC before court and to jail them under it in what he called "A grand design of the NPP to paint NDC black in the eyes of the people". Mr Okai observed that some NDC functionaries and officials were in jail serving various terms while others were still facing court on charges based on the law. "Why this time", he asked and stated that "Revelations from the PAC sittings, the extravagant campaign even for primaries for a flag bearer restricted only to delegates and just the number of aspirants all point to some lose money spinning round the NPP government circles", he stated. Mr Okai supported the call by the flag bearer of the NDC, Prof Atta Mills that the law must stay and recalled what he called "The IFC loan fiasco" among other acts that the NPP government had caused serious financial loss to the state. "What is good for Kofi is good for Kwame" he said and stated that the law must stay untouched, saying, "People afraid of their own shadow of corruption and misappropriation of public and state funds must not panic that the NDC is coming back to power after the 2008 election to put them to the same litmus test for purity". "The law should not be respecter of persons and there should not be one set of laws for one group and another for the other," Mr Okai noted, saying, "All these are indications that the NDC is coming back to power", he said. Mr Okai noted that such a call coming at such a "crucial period" should let the people know how corrupt government officials and said that coupled with economic hardship in the face of a few affluent should let the electorate know if the NPP deserved their mandate to remain in office.