Despite a preponderance of calls by a section of the Ghanaian public for the Health Minister, Kwaku Agyeman-Manu to be sacked, the President has acknowledged his hard work in the sector.
Addressing the chiefs and people of the Bono Region on Tuesday, August 10, 2021, President Nana Akufo-Addo stated that the populous Bono Region has produced a lot of illustrious people in his government, one of which is the Health Minister, Mr Agyeman-Manu.
Speaking in Twi, Nana Akufo-Addo joked about the ongoing criticism of the Health Minister’s handling of the botched Sputnik V vaccine purchase and the calls for him to resign or be sacked.
According to him, the Minister has endured a lot of suffering at the Health Ministry.
His comments in Twi — seen as an endorsement of the Minister’s actions at Ministry — translates as follows: There are a lot of people from the Bono Region in my government; including the Minister of Health, Agyeman-Manu who is currently on the ‘chopping board’. He is an indigene from Dormaa. He has endured suffering at the Health Ministry and is still suffering…
Kwaku Agyeman-Manu has currently been granted a two-week leave to enable him to attend to his private issues.
Reports indicate that the request was granted by the Chief of Staff, Akosua Frema Osei-Opare.
Earlier reports suggested that the Minister had resigned from his position, but the Health Minister in a Facebook post dismissed the report saying “kindly treat it with the utmost of contempt it deserves.”
Led by the #AgyemanMustGo campaign on Twitter, the Health Minister has come under intense criticism for breaching procurement processes while trying to secure Sputnik V vaccines for Ghana.
Pressure group OccupyGhana and a host of other organisations have called for the Health Minister, Kwaku Agyeman-Manu to resign.
According to OccupyGhana the emergency situation created by the pandemic and the urgency required does not constitute sufficient reasons to for the Health Minister to bypass parliamentary approval, cabinet approval, Public Procurement Authority approval or ratification and the endorsing advice of the Attorney-General, all of which are required by law.
