NPP’s Kwaku Baako at Blows with Mahama -Over “Elitist” Bank of Ghana Hospital

The unofficial spokesperson for the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) Abdul Malik Kweku Baako and the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) are slugging it out in a bitter war of words over who inspired the construction of the controversial Bank of Ghana Hospital.

While the NDC insists the multi-million-dollar The Bank Hospital (TBH) is an exclusive legacy of ex-President John Dramani Mahama, Kweku Baako has vehemently rejected the attribution, saying ex-President Mahama had nothing to do with the inspiration for the construction of TBH.

During a radio discussion on Wednesday on Peace FM, Kweku, the Managing Editor of the New Crusading Guide insists that the hospital was conceived during the John Evans Atta Mills and John Mahama’s Administration from 2008 to 2012.

Mr. Baako states: “Indeed, I am on record as indicating that the conception and execution of those two projects can and should be credited to the Mills and Mahama Administrations! This is public record!”

However, in a scathing response, the NDC’s Member of Parliament for Ajumako-Enyan-Esiam, Cassiel Ato Forson, described Kweku Baako’s argument as “warped logic and selective amnesia”.

“As a former member of the Bank of Ghana Board, I am honoured to assert that The Bank Hospital is a proud legacy of the NDC and John Mahama. No amount of unprincipled propaganda gymnastics can change this obvious fact,” Ato Forson jabbed.

“Perhaps Mr Baako should use all that energy to tell us what investments his darling President Akufo-Addo has made in the health sector since assuming the Presidency particularly at this crucial time when we are at war against COVID-19.”

The motive for the passionate furore whipped up by Kweku Baako is not immediately clear as recorded show that the construction for the 60-bed capacity TBH which was completed in 2017, was started in 2014-when John Mahama was Ghana’s President.

Critics believe that Kweku Baako’s rant may have been fuelled by the failure of the Akufo Addo administration to invest in health infrastructure for the more than three years of being in power.

Several of the hospitals that were constructed by the previous NDC administration were virtually left to rot by the NPP administration. The current government has however been jolted into resuscitating these comatose new hospitals after Ghana was struck by the deadly Covid-19 coronavirus outbreak.

The number of infections and intensive care patients are expected to rise as the coronavirus rises steadily in Ghana. The TBH is one of the hospitals activated to care for potential patients. However, the Minister of Health, Kwaku Agyemang Manu recently announced that the ultra-modern hospital will only be used exclusively to care for the rich and the crème de la crème in Ghana.