Zongos Don’t Deserve Football Pitches . . . - Naziru Mohammed

Member of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) Communication Team, Alhaji Naziru Mohammed has described footballers as people who do not have what it takes to become President of the Republic of Ghana.

According to him, qualified people for the Presidency are those who have gone to school to study law and other professions to acquire knowledge and not mere professional footballers without governance knowledge.

Speaking on Okay FM’s 'Ade Akye Abia' Morning Show, he claimed that the Akufo-Addo government has reduced Zongos to only football professionals and also people who are only good for entertainment and not educated people to rub shoulders with them in the country.

He added that President Akufo-Addo’s father did not build a gym for him even though he [Nana Addo] loves boxing, but rather educated him to become a renowned lawyer who is now President of the Republic; wondering why President Akufo-Addo only saw the needs of Zongos to be constructing football pitches and not to see them climb the academic ladder.

“Akufo-Addo likes boxing and why didn’t his father build him a gym to learn how to box but rather sent him to school to become a lawyer . . .  when it comes to the Presidency, we cannot use football profession to become a President, we rather use law and other acquired knowledge in schools to become President,” he asserted.

He said Dr. Bawumia and the NDC do not come nowhwere close to the contribution of the NDC in Zongos in terms of infrastructural development like constructing gutters, roads, community centres and classrooms.

“The place where Dr Bawumia made those comments, former President Mahama has constructed 18 unit classroom blocks for the Zongo kids and not a football pitch for the kids to learn how to play,” he stated.

“Dr Bawumia is now telling us that he has built playing grounds for the Zongos and so he has solved our problems for us. We want to tell him that we are discerning now and we want to see progress in terms of acquiring knowledge as we have seen others acquiring in order to add their quota to the socio-economic development of the country," he mentioned.

He, therefore, stressed that the NDC sees Zongos as their par and not a group of people afar from the socio-economic development of the country; adding that the NDC is ready and prepared to support people from the Zongo to occupy the highest position of the land without any discrimination.