Ghana’s Debt Crisis Not Competence Failure – Amin Adam
A Former Finance Minister has attributed Ghana’s recurring debt crises and repeated engagements with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to failures of integrity and institutional discipline rather than a shortage of competent professionals.
Dr. Mohammed Amin Adam said Ghana had never lacked brilliant citizens capable of managing the country’s affairs, but had, at various points in its history, suffered from the failure of some capable people to uphold ethical standards when confronted with opportunities to compromise.
Dr Amin Adam made the observation in a keynote address at the second annual AntaNextGen Leadership Summit in Tamale, where he challenged 50 young people selected from across Ghana to embrace integrity as they prepare for leadership.
“Ghana’s history — our debt crises, our repeated IMF programmes — our institutional fragility has never primarily been a competence problem. We have never lacked brilliant Ghanaians,” he said.
The Karaga MP said the more fundamental challenge had been the absence, at critical moments, of leaders and professionals who were prepared to maintain their principles even when doing otherwise offered personal or institutional advantages.
“What we have lacked, at times, are brilliant Ghanaians who refused to cut corners when cutting corners was profitable,” he said.
Dr Amin Adam warned that competence without character could be more dangerous to a country than incompetence because highly skilled individuals possessed greater capacity to exploit weaknesses in institutions.
“The most dangerous person in any institution is not the incompetent one. It is the highly capable one who decided integrity was optional,” he said.
The former Finance Minister urged the young participants to establish their ethical boundaries before attaining positions of authority, saying leadership demanded decisions that could withstand public scrutiny and personal accountability.
He challenged them to determine early what they would and would not do with power.
“Decide now, before you have power, what you will refuse to do with it. Decide it today, while it is cheap, because it gets far more expensive to decide once you are holding power or leadership in any organisation,” he said.
Dr Amin Adam said the lesson was particularly important for young people who would eventually occupy positions in government, business, civil society and other institutions.
He said the country needed a new generation of leaders whose abilities were matched by strong moral principles, accountability and a willingness to put the national interest ahead of personal gain.
The keynote address formed part of the second annual AntaNextGen Leadership Summit, a four-day leadership development programme designed to equip young people with practical skills in leadership, project design, funding proposal development, mentorship, networking and volunteerism.
The Executive Director of the AntaNextGen Foundation, Alhaji Mohammed Iddrisu Saani, said the foundation was committed to expanding the initiative to give more young people opportunities to develop their leadership potential.
He said the 50 participants at this year’s summit represented an increase from the 30 participants who took part in the maiden edition.
Alhaji Saani said the Anta Leadership Summit had come to stay and would continue to build a generation of young people equipped with the practical skills and values needed to confront Ghana’s emerging challenges.
CREDIT: Iddrisu Kumbundoo
