Put political colours aside and combat corruption - Okudjeto

A member of the Council of State, Mr Sam Okudjeto has urged all Ghanaians to cast aside their party colours in order to combat the "cancer" of corruption in public office.

Mr Okudjeto in a welcome address at a roundtable discussion organised by the Institute of Economic Affairs in Accra on Wednesday, bemoaned the current state of affairs where politicians jump to the defense of their party members even if they are shown to be corrupt.

He said such shocking defenses of corruption only stunt the development of the country and benefit a few selfish individuals.

"We need a consensus among ourselves because everything you say depends on which side of the political divide you are. I want to charge the politician to say that this issue is in the national interest and therefore we should put our political caps aside and tackle it as a national issue because if we do not all of us are the losers," Mr Okudjeto said.

"Just imagine when they say someone took six million to sign a contract - whether it's true or false I don't know - and put the money in his bank account which has been found... And yet when you look at the climate and you see children lying flat on the ground in a classroom with no desks... Some are in maths classes and writing on trees, I am not making it up, just imagine how much is needed to provide a classroom?"

He said after witnessing such instances of poverty, he gets mad when politicians put their party interests before their national interests.

He stressed: "When you see those things and then people are pontificating about the party, I get mad and I say for God sake put the party aside and look at the national interest... This is a topic that is very close to my heart".