Commentary, News

Presidential debate: Will Mahama and Bawumia go head to head?

By Jeremiah Nutsugah

In advanced democracies, presidential debates are a cornerstone of the electoral process, allowing voters to scrutinize the policies and personalities of the candidates.

However presidential debates are defined as events that seek to bring presidential aspirants before a restricted audience of citizens for purposeful dialogue and allow the citizens to either directly or indirectly solicit answers to pertinent questions posed to aspirants.

Since 2000, presidential debates have been organized by the Institute of Economic Affairs ( IEA) Ghana for presidential aspirants of various political parties in Ghana.

The forum has been used by political aspirants to articulate their programs and policy options to answer questions from the public.

The call for debates is not something new in Ghana The first presidential debate was organised by the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA-Ghana) in 2000, between Vice President John Mills and the then governing party’s candidate John Kufuor.

In 2004, Kufuor also declined to participate in a debate, but Mills did. The 2008 election saw all major parties participate in a televised debate, including Akufo-Addo and Mills. In 2012, for the first time, a sitting president, Mahama, participated in a debate and subsequently won the election.

However, there were no debates in the 2016 and 2020 elections as both Mahama and Akufo-Addo avoided the forum.

The main question is can presidential debates influence voters in making decisions on whom to vote for in the run up to Ghana’s December 2024 general elections?

As the mood for 2024 election is building up ahead of the crucial ballots in December as parties and candidates fights for momentum. Dr Bawumia( NPP) challenged Mr Mahama ( NDC) to a debate ahead of the December polls to give Ghanaians the opportunity to critique their policies and visions.

But the 2024 Mahama Campaign Team has declined the offer, arguing that nothing is left to debate about the economy and insisting that Mahama does not need a debate to sell his message.

Mahama said, The debate between myself and President Akufo-Addo is important to settle all these issues (Indian funding for Tema-Mpakadan rail) but they said they won’t come; it is still not too late for him to accept to debate me,” Mr Mahama said to party supporters at Atimpoku as part of his four-day Eastern Regional campaign tour.

In recent weeks both the NPP and the NDC have pointed fingers at each other for not wanting to debate the other.

Taking it to 2020, barely a month before the 2020 general elections, Mr Mahama called out President Akufo-Addo to enter a debate with him but the his excellency Akufo-Addo rejected it.

Now in 2024 it’s Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia who is now calling for the debate.

This has led to The Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) On July 17,2024 to announced plans to host a presidential debate ahead of the 2024 elections, featuring key political parties. Which the debate aims to enable voters to make informed decisions by allowing them to evaluate candidates’ policies, discuss issues, and present their visions.

However The Mahama 2024 Campaign has issued a strong condemnation of the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) Ghana over its recent announcement.

The campaign criticised the IEA for not engaging or informing the National Democratic Congress (NDC), one of Ghana’s major political parties, before making the announcement.

The Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA), a think tank, has stated that it has not engaged nor informed any political party or presidential aspirant to participate in its presidential and vice-presidential debates.

It has, therefore, dismissed claims that the IEA was fronting for the flag bearer of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) ahead of a potential presidential debate later this year.

This has called for both party leaders and experts to say something about it.

Speaking on the Asaase Breakfast Show on Friday (12 July), Agyeman-Duah said presidential debates should be made part of the political conventions in the country.

“I think my friend made mention of the American system where they have the commission for presidential debates, could that thing work here, possibly.”

“But I think I agree with my good friend Prof John Osae-Kwapong, that, it is something that we need to develop, we should make it part of our political conventions,”

Majority Leader in Parliament, Hon. Alexander Afenyo-Markin, has invited National Democratic Congress (NDC) flagbearer John Dramani Mahama to engage in a debate on national issues.

“We are calling on President Mahama to accept Dr. Bawumia’s invitation for a debate, where we can discuss the issues at hand,” Hon. Afenyo-Markin stated.

Meanwhile speaking in an interview on Okay FM on Monday, July 22,2024 the National Chairman of NDC brushed aside calls for presidential debate between the Flagbearer of his party John Dramani Mahama and that of the NPP, Vice President Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia.

He had Dr. Bawumia should focus on debating his records and statements he made in the past when he was in opposition because he is being found out by Ghanaians.