Former president, John Dramani Mahama has expressed displeasure at government’s posture on the Electronic Transaction Levy (E-Levy).
Speaking to members of the clergy in a meeting in Accra, the 2020 presidential candidate of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) said the decision to reduce the charge from 1.75% to 1.50% is as if the government is doing negotiations at the Makola market.
“Dialogue comes from the ruling party, we are in opposition we have nothing. If the ruling party says come and dialogue of course we will come and sit and dialogue. If you are bringing something like E-levy, why was there no dialogue before you introduce it in parliament?
“It is only after introducing it and there is a pushback then you say come and let us dialogue. When you go and set your 1.75 percent and then you bring and you say because there is a pushback, the country is pushing back, the Minority is pushing back then you come and say let us dialogue, then you say, I have reduced it to 1.5, It is like we are negotiating in Makola [Market],” John Dramani Mahama has said.
He said the brawl in Parliament in December 2021 on the levy was a fight by the Minority to protect the country’s democracy.
According to John Dramani Mahama, the Akufo-Addo government in the last four years has become autocratic.
“E-levy is not the problem. E-levy is the symptom of what has gone on for the last four years, government feels that it can ride over anybody and take decisions and bring anything into parliament, do whatever it like, pass its decisions it wants without dialoguing because we have 169 seats.
“So the current 137-137 seats is a withdrawal symptom. So the government has to climb down from its high horse and realize that the people of Ghana have been tired of that tyrannical, dictatorial majority rule that they have,” John Dramani Mahama shared.
