⋄ 10 - A Response to Lloyd G. Adu Amoah’s ‘Ghana’s Democracy and the 2020 General Election:

Adu Amoah’s ‘Ghana’s Democracy and the 2020 General Election: Signs of a Fading Promise?’ Introduction ers’ towards political parties, as the author suggests, it is rather the case Amoah’s pessimistic assess- Nene-Lomotey Kuditchar that the electorate demonstrated a ment of Ghana’s democ- Department of Political Science maturity beyond the political party racy published in CODES- University of Gha. [...] The author 2016 democratic deviations tion of power between the New Pa- also blames the lack of material triotic Party (NPP) and the Nation- prosperity on the ‘the pervasive To begin with, the author’s sugges- al Democratic Congress (NDC), party system’ working in tandem tion that ‘no cudgels, loss of life, or the country’s main political par- with a culture of ‘ winner-takes- loss of property’ at. [...] effects of the extremist tendencies property’ had attended power tran- that characterised the NPP’s ten- fers, any euphoria expressed over The author’s use of the outcome the health of Ghana’s democracy of the 2016 elections to pessimis- ure after the 2016 elections. [...] These illustrations of devia- Source: (Bortey 2021: 3) tion from the normative expecta- The author also noted that ‘Ghana’s Second, the National House Chiefs tions of democracy served as the democratic promise is failing to (NHC) in 2018 led successful agita- backdrop to the 2020 elections, materialise’ due to the unmet ma- tion against an attempt by the NPP during which the electorate voted teria. [...] Against are willing to honour their tax ob- stability between 1981 and 1992 this background, the outcome of the ligations to the state even though and transformed from an anocra- 2020 elections, which technically 61 per cent do not know what the cy (1992–2000) into an inter- and curtailed the reach of the president’s revenue raised is used for.