Ghana’s leading candidates for president in a last-minute vote-gathering

The two leading candidates for president of Ghana held opposing rallies in the capital, Accra, on Thursday night in an attempt to win over voters before Saturday’s legislative and presidential elections in the second-largest cocoa producer in the world.

The leader of the main opposition National Democratic Congress party, former president John Dramani Mahama, urged voters to “reset the country” during an address to hundreds of supporters in the Madina area, saying that the election was a pivotal moment for the country.

“This election isn’t your typical one. “This is a pivotal moment for our country,” Mahama declared.

According to pre-election polls, Mahama is the clear favorite. By portraying Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia, the leader of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP), as the architect of the policies that caused the crisis, his campaign has capitalized on Ghana’s worst economic crisis in a decade.

Speaking to hundreds of supporters at the University of Ghana campus a few kilometers away, former central banker Bawumia praised Ghana’s recovery from the crisis and claimed that, in spite of the difficulties, the country’s economy had done better than it had under Mahama’s administration from 2012 to 2016.

“The macroeconomic situation is completely different. “We’ve created more jobs than him,” he told jubilant supporters wearing the party’s red, blue, and white colors, pointing to Ghana’s consistent economic progress.

“We’ve kept the lights on,” he declared, referring to the power shortages that shook Mahama’s years in Ghana. “On what basis does Mahama want to come back?”

A 69-year-old former NPP supporter in 2016, Philip Doh told Reuters he would be supporting Mahama this time around due to Ghana’s debt load and the existing government’s inability to combat corruption.

After the ruling NPP instituted a free high school program, Kofi Ayensu, 39, declared he would support it.