Has Akufo-Addo just endorsed the Health Minister’s actions that led to the Sputnik V scandal?
President Akufo-Addo has endorsed Health Minister, Kwaku Agyeman-Manu who is under pressure to resign from his position
President Akufo-Addo has openly praised the Minister of Health who is under pressure from Ghanaians to vacate his post for violating procurement laws in his attempts to procure Covid-19 vacinnes for Ghana.
Speaking in the local dialect Twi, Nana Akufo-Addo then joked about the ongoing criticism following the Health Minister’s handling of the botched Sputnik V vaccine purchase and the calls for him to resign or be sacked.
He explained that the Minister has endured a lot of suffering at the Health Ministry.
His comments in Twi, seen as an endorsement of the Minister’s actions at the Ministry translates as follows: There are a lot of people from the Bono Region in my government; including the Minister of Health, Agyeman-Manu who is currently on the ‘chopping board’. He is an indigene from Dormaa. He has endured suffering at the Health Ministry and is still suffering.
As it stands now Kwaku Agyeman-Manu is currently on a two-week leave to enable him to attend to his private issues. According to reports, the request was granted by the Chief of Staff, Akosua Frema Osei-Opare.
Earlier reports suggested that the Minister had resigned from his position, but the Health Minister in a Facebook post dismissed the reports saying, “kindly treat it with the utmost of contempt it deserves.”
Led by the #AgyemanMustGo campaign on Twitter, the Health Minister has come under intense criticism for breaching procurement processes while trying to secure Sputnik V vaccines for Ghana.
Pressure group OccupyGhana and a host of other organizations have called for the Health Minister, Kwaku Agyeman-Manu to resign or be sacked by President Akufo-Addo who now seems to be okay with the Minister still being on the job.
According to OccupyGhana the emergency situation created by the pandemic and the urgency required does not constitute sufficient reasons for the Health Minister to bypass parliamentary approval, cabinet approval, Public Procurement Authority approval or ratification and the endorsing advice of the Attorney-General, all of which are required by law.
By: Stella Annan | myactiveonline.com Twitter @activetvgh
