Ghana’s ex-president and main opposition leader, John Dramani Mahama, has been formally declared winner of the just concluded Presidential election in the country.
Mahama, who is 66 years, once served as Ghana’s president from 2012 to 2016.
He had defeated Bawumia who he described as a representation of the continuation of the policies that led to Ghana’s worst economic crisis in a generation.
The electoral commission through provisional results noted that he won Saturday’s presidential election with 56.55% of the vote.
This revelation comes as Mahama’s main rival, vice president and ruling-party presidential candidate Mahamudu Bawumia, accepted defeat on Sunday in both presidential and legislative elections to ease tensions.
According to the electoral commission, it had counted votes from 267 out of the West African country’s 276 constituencies. Voter turnout was 60.9%.
“This mandate serves as a constant reminder of what fate awaits us if we fail to reach the aspirations of our people and govern with arrogance,” he told jubilant supporters at his campaign grounds after results were announced.
Ghana suffers from economic and cost-of-living crisis.
The country produces cocoa, gold and oil, hit the popularity of Akufo-Addo’s government and increased momentum for a change in leadership.
“The victory shows that the Ghanaian people have little tolerance for bad governance,” he added, promising “severe measures and governance reforms” to “reset our nation”.
In an interview with Reuters before the election, Mahama said he would seek to renegotiate terms of a $3-billion International Monetary Fund bailout secured last year to restructure the country’s debt.
He had also pledged to ease business regulations, introduce a 24-hour triple-shift work system, enact tax reforms and invest $10 billion in modernising infrastructure.