Transparency International last week released a Corruption Perception Index (CPI) rating Ghana as the country with the second highest respondents (about 71 per cent) saying that corruption had increased over the last 12 months.
Titled “People and Corruption: Africa Survey 2015”, the report which covered March 2014 to September 2015, revealed that corruption was so endemic that all the respondents wished their leaders acted swiftly to end the canker.
But speaking at the Second High Level Conference on the National Anti-Corruption Action Plan in Accra, President Mahama accused some political leaders and sections of the media deliberately distorting the report at the expense of the country’s dignity and international image.
“This is absolutely false and for emphasis, I repeat, this is absolutely false,” he said.
President Mahama further bemoaned the highly charged partisan political environment in the country and questioned the motivation for which sections of the public would “be so obsessed with trying to claim such an undignified title for ourselves at the expense of our nation’s dignity and our international image?”
He also chastised the media for wrongly interpreting the report, saying, “Sad to say, many other media networks including our own respected national daily, the Graphic also ran along with this falsehood and got the entire country engaged in a conversation that should never have taken place.”
President Mahama noted that, the “misleading” reports have given the country an undeserved negative image amongst the committee of nations and the international community as a whole.
(Selorm) | 
(Nana Kwesi)