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Former President Jerry John Rawlings says until Ghanaians assume the right, duty and responsibility to assist in confronting the fight against corruption, government would have a hard time doing it alone.

He said the corruption he faced when he first came to power in 1979 was not as bad as what is being confronted today.

Flt Lt Rawlings stated that, “the current government owes its own survival to the anti-corruption crusade,” explaining that some administrations who found the integrity level of the AFRC/PNDC too high and intimidating made it a point to corrupt some of our national institutions in order to survive.

The former President who spoke during a meeting with a delegation of political leaders from Sierra Leone led by former Vice-President Chief Sam-Sumana on Sunday, said each administration’s refusal to contain and punish corruption, invariably provided the climate and opportunity for the problem to eat deeper into the fabric of the nation to the extent that one could only succeed by doing things the wrong way.

“By the time this administration came into office the country was literally drowning in the practice of corruption with impunity. This administration has therefore inherited national corruption at its worst,” Mr. Rawlings stated.

Former President Rawlings told his guests that the revolution brought the best out of the people. He recalled several efforts supported by Western powers to derail the process, including the deportation of one million Ghanaians from Nigeria under Shehu Shagari’s administration.