Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

The fact of the matter is that the Constitution itself is no ideational human personality that enshrined the obligatory provision of free Senior High School into itself. The Constitution is indisputably a veritable instrument of human will and ideals. In other words, it was some human beings called “Constitutional Framers” who foresightedly inserted such provision into our proverbial working political bible. Mr. Mahama seems to clearly recognize this fact. What his woefully cynical and parochial imagination prevents him from honestly acknowledging, is the glaringly inescapable fact of reality that it was a nameable individual whose free-education proposal was collectively endorsed by the framers of our Constitution, who consequently enshrined the same therein.

And so, yes, historically speaking, it is possible for an individual Ghanaian citizen to lay a wholly legitimate claim to having originated the constitutional ideology of free-education. In modern Ghanaian history, for example, it is clearly appreciated and widely recognized that free-education as a national political agenda was originally articulated by the pre-Nkrumah and Danquah-Grant-led United Gold Coast Convention (UGCC), although many woefully misguided followers of the former and late Ghanaian dictator casually credit President Nkrumah with the same.

But even more significant is the fact that any Ghanaian scholar who has ever bothered to study the celebrated, albeit little known, Working Papers of the Danquah-led Gold Coast Youth Conference is indisputably aware of the fact that the primal proposition of free-education in colonial Ghana, as a prelude to the creation of a progressive Independent Ghana, was both first publicly pronounced and authored by Mr. William (Paa Willie) Ofori-Atta.

What is rather insulting is the insufferably arrogant suggestion by President Mahama that Ghanaian children and youths, somehow, have to wait at his beck until 2016, while he presumably prepares for his second term in office, imperiously assuming that, indeed, he has already won Election 2012, before they can be able to access their constitutionally mandated right to a fee-free education from Pre-K through Twelfth Grade.

Needless to say, even as the Okyenhene rhetorically retorted recently, why does President Mahama curiously suppose that he can casually put self-employed mercenary journalists like Messrs. Kwesi Pratt and Ben Ephson, for ready examples, on criminally fat monthly salaries reportedly in excess of $40,000.00 (Forty-Thousand Dollars) a piece, with free access to government-owned gas-filling stations, while, somehow, it is decidedly tabooed for anybody to raise the critical question of a tuition-free education for our children and grandchildren?

Couple the preceding with the entrenched neocolonialist and exploitive policy of providing free housing and automobiles for Ministers of State, among a plethora of other so-called public officials and public servants, and the imperative need for an immediate change of government becomes non-negotiable.

As for his incessant and annoying talk about “schools under trees,” maybe somebody ought to remind the former NDC-MP from Bole-Bamboi that his National Democratic Congress has dominated Ghanaian politics for at least 21 of the last 30 years!

Interestingly, even as I write this piece, I have in front of me a copy of an article captioned “How to Score the Presidential Debate,” in which the globally renowned and award-winning New York Times columnist Dr. Thomas L. Friedman, attributes the precipitous decline of the American economy to the moment that Washington, or the United States Federal Government, ceased to studiously and generously fund public education from Pre-K through an undergraduate university degree (See New York Times/San Jose Mercury News 10/17/12).

And in Ghana, President John Dramani Mahama would have his people passively wait on him until 2016, in order to have our children offered a fee-free senior high school education? What insolence!?

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.
Department of English
Nassau Community College of SUNY

The opinions expressed here are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views or have the endorsement of the Editorial Board of www.africanewsanalysis.com and www.africa-forum.net

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

Eighteen years into democratic African majority rule in “Mandelaland,” it is becoming increasingly clear that African politicians, all over the continent, in fact, are far more interested in lining their pockets with pelf – or undeserved public dole – than tirelessly and sacrificially working towards the rapid intellectual and cultural emancipation of their people.

Indeed, so abjectly dehumanizing has the situation become that some former ardent critics of the erstwhile Apartheid regime are beginning to wonder whether, in fact, the deposed racist regime would not have fared remarkably better under the present circumstances. Under the Afrikaner regime, the problem with indigenous African public education was largely one of quality and relevance, particularly in the galling wake of “Bantustanization.”

Now, though, with the African National Congress (ANC) government having been in charge of affairs for nearly two decades now, the problem has come to revolve around the virtual non-delivery of such curricular fundamentals as textbooks and other stationery supplies. Just recently, it shockingly came to light that for more than half of the current academic year, over 5,000 schools, largely located in the countryside, had gone without textbooks. And contrary to what one may be reasonably led to suspect, this has not been due to a group of white supremacists steadily, consistently and fairly successfully attacking supply lines – or routes – but primarily because government appointees charged with facilitating the smooth-running of the public educational system woefully lack the professional discipline and the requisite sense of civic responsibility to carry out the same.

Consequently, it comes as absolutely no surprise, at all, that civil society groups have mounted pressure on President Jacob Zuma to have him fire Education Minister Angie Motshekga. This ramshackle state of affairs also aptly prompted the country’s best-known Nobel Literature Prize laureate, Ms. Nadine Gordimer, who is now 88 years old, to characterize the situation as both a “shambles” and a “total wreck.”

This heart-rending observation comes shortly after another Nobel (Peace) Prize laureate and former Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town, Desmond Tutu, bitterly lamented that were 94-year-old former President Nelson R. Mandela aware of the indescribably poor state of the country’s public educational system, “he would be reduced to tears.”

It is not clear, though, whether, indeed, merely dismissing Ms. Motshekga, the country’s education minister, per se, would in any way appreciably meliorate the problem. Needless to say, the problem appears to more systemic than personal, although it is also quite likely that the sector minister’s own administrative ineptitude may have significantly compounded the same.

The situation in not-so-far-away Ghana is not very different. In the latter instance, the spotlight on public education seems to have been inordinately focused on the patently regressive politics of scoring cheap electoral points. Until his tragic, albeit not altogether unexpected, passing on July 24, 2012, for example, Ghana’s President John Evans Atta-Mills’ government of the so-called National Democratic Congress (NDC) had focused on the cosmetic aspect of supplying a one-size-fits-all school uniforms and cheap exercise books, with the more fundamentally significant aspects of textbook supplies and curricular development virtually left in the lurch.

In sum, while it may appear on the surface of it to be progressive, nevertheless, the disturbingly cosmetic Ghanaian case in point ended up with the same dispiriting results of churning out semi-literate graduates, in the best-case scenario, and complete illiterates – in both the official language of instruction as well as indigenous language development, for the most part.

Also, in the Ghanaian context, what made matters even more insufferable was the fact of the country’s late president having been a veteran and senior professor at Ghana’s flagship academy, the University of Ghana.

Ghana’s ruling National Democratic Congress has also whittled away at the quality of the country’s high school system by reducing its curricular duration from four to three years, with the rather lame policy pretext of cost cutting. The old system that made this postcolonial leader’s quality of education the envy of the entire African continent was five years, plus an elite two-year pre-university – or advanced level – system inherited from Britain.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D., is Associate Professor of English, Journalism and Creative Writing at Nassau Community College of the State University of New York, Garden City. He is Director of The Sintim-Aboagye Center for Politics and Culture and author of “Dr. J. B. Danquah: Architect of Modern Ghana” (iUniverse.com, 2005). E-mail: okoampaahoofe@gmail.com

The opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views or have the endorsement of the Editorial Board f www.africanewsanalysis.com and www.africa-forum.net

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

“On New Year’s Eve, President Nkrumah announced that he would hold a referendum from January 24th to January 31st to ask the people of Ghana to endorse his plan to make Ghana a one-party state, and to give him powers to dismiss Supreme and High Court Judges as he likes. Two days later[,] an official Ghanaian statement alleged that a Police Constable had fired five shots at President Nkrumah, and the following day an incredibly placid photograph, purporting to show the President subduing his assailant, was published widely [sic] in the world press. ¶ This morning we are given the news of the second arrest and detention of Dr. J. B. Danquah, one of Ghana’s most distinguished citizens, and a leading member of the Opposition. We also hear news of the dismissal of the Chief of Police and nine other senior members of the police force, two of whom have also been detained. At the same time[,] there is news of mass rallies throughout the country by Nkrumah’s CPP to launch a campaign for the Referendum. The campaign has been appropriately called – ‘Operation Yes’; of course, no rallied will be allowed to launch ‘Operation No.’ Everything is being done to create an atmosphere of mass hysteria, fanaticism, fear and intimidation, and the object of the exercise is not to ascertain the wishes of the people, but merely to attain a managed, mechanical endorsement of the President’s express will. ¶ According to precedent in Ghana[,] the Referendum is likely to be interpreted to mean that it is unnecessary to hold the election promised for 1965. There has not been a General Election in Ghana since the one held in 1956, before independence”(The Courage And Foresight of Busia 43).

It is also worth highlighting the last paragraph of the foregoing quote, because the pat and cavalier tendency has been for Nkrumah fanatics to vehemently and intransigently insist that the CPP regime that was auspiciously overthrown by the National Liberation Council (NLC) junta on February 24, 1966, had been freely and democratically elected by the citizens and people of Ghana. To-date, none of the staunch adherents of the foregoing argumentative tack, or stance, has bothered to explain to both their fellow citizens and the rest of the civilized world, at large, why a reasonably intelligent Ghanaian populace would so slavishly consent not to hold even a single general election for the 10-year period from 1956 to 1966, even as the very same people regularly suffered the abject ignobility of being forcibly herded into the polling booth to rubberstamp the neo-fascist dictatorship of President Nkrumah and his so-called Convention People’s Party. The answer, of course, is not far-fetched at all; and in the “eyewitness” and unassailably erudite opinion of the leader of the erstwhile United Party, it is tersely as follows:

“The widening circle of purges tells its own unmistakable story of the people’s opposition to the Nkrumah regime from which they suffer, not only political oppression, but widespread economic hardship. The standard of living of farmers and workers alike has been falling steadily. The economic situation was vividly summed up by a Ghanaian market woman, who said – ‘Ghana today is a country in which the situation of all who work may be likened to corn growing; we grow corn for the President and his few Party zealots, and we are paid with the husks, for which we are expected to be dutifully grateful.’ If votes could be free, the ‘No’ to the Referendum could not be in doubt, but detentions and organized intimidation will probably ensure the ‘yes’ that the President wants. Against his oppressive and managed measures[,] I have no ‘secret scheme,’ as has been reported; but I maintain my faith that the people of Ghana will, sooner or later, reject the servitude and indignity by which President Nkrumah dishonors our country. His imposition of one-party rule will not be permanently endured. Dictatorship is not an inevitable path for Ghana, or indeed for any [other] country. All peoples love freedom, and victory is eventually on the side of those who dare to try for it. The opposition in Ghana to Nkrumah’s dictatorship cannot be destroyed by the Referendum, or crushed by detentions and ruthless dictatorship”(The Courage And Foresight of Busia 43-44).

Indeed, so morally bankrupt, intellectually vacuous and logically facile had the African Show Boy become, by the eve of his overthrow, that he would in March 1965 issue the most lame-brained of public challenges, daring a never-implicated Dr. Busia to forensically prove his innocence in the alleged assassination plot and attempt on the life of the then-Prime Minister Nkrumah in the 1958 Awhaitey Affair. The future Prime Minister Busia, ever the inimitable wit for which he was globally renowned and celebrated, riposted as follows (of course, clearly bearing in mind the fact that Nkrumah had summarily denied Dr. Danquah the same human right just the year before):

“I looked in vain [from a meticulous reading of his parliamentary address] for the specific charges of which evidence is to be presented against me. They are not stated. While I am extremely interested to note that at least in form President Nkrumah is prepared to allow some third party judgment in deciding the validity of the reckless but unspecified charges he has made against me, he must be aware of the preposterous suggestion he makes. It is unthinkable to be used to gratify the ends of another State, or put itself to the expense or undertake the extremely serious security risks involved. Can he point to any instance where this has been done before? Whether he can or not, is he himself prepared to submit to such procedure? Would he, for instance, submit himself to charges of complicity in the murder of Mr. Obetsebi-lamptey, and Dr. J. B. Danquah in his detention prisons, to mention but two? He[,] of course[,] has what[ever] is left of the wealth of Ghana behind him, and therefore it would be more reasonable for him to submit himself to trial in the way he proposes than it would be for me who have none of these resources. I challenge President Nkrumah to agree to submit himself to the same procedures”(The Courage And Foresight of Busia 46; underscore appears in the original).

In his March 26 address to the Ghana National Assembly, an apparently morally shameless President Nkrumah had issued his challenge as follows: “I repeat again our offer to present further evidence against Busia, Kow Richardson, Taylor and their evil criminal [sic] associates, evidence which is conclusive against these traitors who spread lies about Ghana. ¶ Our offer to invite the United Nations to appoint a tribunal to try them faces them and their newspaper supporters with a test they must meet. ¶ If they are frightened to come to Accra, let the Tribunal hear our evidence in a sister African State. This challenge is directed as well to those in the world who malign us”(The Courage And Foresight of Busia 45).

The received narrative and/or standard textbook presentation of postcolonial Ghanaian history almost invariably depicts the late and former Prime Minister K. A. Busia as a decided political exile who spent most of the late 1950s and early to mid-1960s abroad and far removed from the infernal frontlines of the righteous war against the neo-fascist regime of the Nkrumah-led Convention People’s Party. Needless to say, what such standard accounts casually ignore is the fact that the great statesman, politician, scholar, social scientist and thinker was as functionally active and potent in exile as he had earlier been at home, and perhaps even more puissant in terms of the necessary spotlight which Busia scorchingly focused on the repressive activities of Nkrumah’s CPP government. Thus in the wake of the Show Boy’s megalomaniacal declaration of Ghana as a one-party state in 1964, for instance, Busia released an extensive and trenchant message to both the people of Ghana and the international community at large, detailing the insufferably ill-advised nature of such policy and rallying all Ghanaian patriots and lovers of a democratic culture in the fierce fight against the new tyrannical regime. Titled “Ghana Will Be Truly Free And Happy: Message To The People Of Ghana – 21st December, 1964”(See The Courage And Foresight of Busia 49-59), among a host of other things, Nkrumah’s former political arch-rival and ideological nemesis made the following observations:

“The one-party regime has cast a shadow of fear and anxiety and sorrowful gloom over the whole country. It has made a hollow mockery of the country’s motto: Freedom and Justice.¶ Before independence[,] Nkrumah led men, women and children to shout ‘Freedom!’ – at party rallies, in the markets, in the streets, in all the towns and villages in the country. But today, anyone who shouts ‘Freedom!’ risks imprisonment without trial. Why? Because there is no freedom in Ghana and Nkrumah does not want to be reminded [of the fact] that he has betrayed his promises and deceived the people. His one-party regime has been accompanied by ruthlessness and cruelty and oppression – by unjust dismissals, house arrests, imprisonments without trial, mass poverty, unemployment, and all forms of economic hardship. I do not need to remind you of the large number of Brigaders and Young Pioneers, or the new Party Police, or the large number of paid secret informants in taxis, buses, public offices and private homes; nor do I need to remind you of the thousands of Ghanaians, young and old, men and women, who languish indefinitely in prison without trial, their families and the country deprived of their services. These arrests and detentions which started eight years ago[,] still continue. As you well know, nowadays[,] people are arrested in secret, sometimes at dead of night, and taken away to prisons. Their families do not know where they are detained or how they are being treated. No one is safe. Cabinet ministers and even security officers have themselves been arrested. Not even those who are thought to be close to Nkrumah or hold high posts in his party are safe. Everyone has heard of the detention of the former Minister of Information [Mr. Tawiah Adamafio], or the former Minister of Foreign Affairs [Mr. Ako-Adjei], or of Dr. Danquah; but few know that among the recent detainees were Chief S. D. Dombo, Leader of the ‘Minority Group’ in Parliament, or Mr. William Ofori-Atta, of the United Party, Dr. Kuta-Dankwa, known to be a close friend of the Minister of Foreign Affairs. I could extend the list ad nauseam. Many of you know the new slogan: ‘One o’clock [fever].’ It refers to the 1pm news bulletin in Ghana for which everyone waits anxiously. Many people, including Cabinet Ministers and Regional Commissioners, heave sighs of relief if they do not hear, in the one o’clock news broadcast, that they or others for whom they care have been dismissed, or that orders for their detention have been signed. So people live from day to day in painful and anxious suspense.¶ ….¶….

“There are no free trade unions in Ghana. The trade unions have long been under control, and instead of protecting the interest and welfare of the worker, and helping him to get what he needs, the unions have been used to keep the worker down, and make him a slave to toil for Nkrumah and his henchmen. ¶ No aspect of social life is being left without control. It is now the turn of the Universities. Professors have been dismissed, and students have been arrested and sent to prison without trial. Everybody must conform or be crushed. As it has been made apparent in the party press, the guns will be trained against religion and beliefs, and that will give ground for more people to be thrown into prison without trial. ¶ The press, which in some countries champions the freedom of the people, is now an instrument of oppression in Ghana. It denounces civil servants, judges, even party members, and all who do not toe the party line, and the denunciation is usually a prelude to demotion, dismissal or detention. Far from defending the rights of the people, the Ghana press frequently urges the Government to mete out savage punishments and ruthless oppression. ¶ The press is also making enemies for Ghana by its irresponsible attacks on countries which it dubs as capitalist, such as Britain, France, the United States and West Germany. At the same time[,] the Government seeks investments from these very countries. A Ghanaian delegation recently visited the United States. At a press conference it held in New York, a Ghanaian journalist, who was a member of the delegation, when questioned about the attacks on the United States in the Ghanaian press[,] tried to justify them, and his futile performance wrecked any good [that] the delegation might have done to attract investment. But even more reprehensible and disgusting are the attacks on other African States, among them Nigeria, Congo (Leopoldville), Liberia, the Ivory Coast and Tanganyika. This makes Nkrumah’s avowed aspiration for African unity questionable. The much-advertised Ghana-Guinea-Mali Union came to nothing because Mali did not want Nkrumah’s dictatorship, and there have been subversive activities against other African governments, suspected or known to have been financed or directed from Ghana; such accusations have been made in respect of Togo, Liberia, Nigeria, the Ivory Coast, Sierra Leone, the Cameroons and the Congo; and Ghana’s subversive attempts to prevent the creation of a union between Senegal and the Gambia, and also the Federation of the East African States of Uganda, Kenya, Tanganyika and Zanzibar is now common knowledge throughout Africa. It is now generally accepted that Nkrumah is not really seeking unity, but only the domination of Africa; a dream which other African leaders regard as ridiculous and unreal. But Nkrumah continues to spend millions of pounds of much-needed public funds on his selfish schemes to spread dictatorial rule. Consequently, there are top-level talks for more practicable steps towards co-operation and eventual unions from which Ghana[,] for the time being[,] is excluded. In our own interest, and for the good of Africa, we must learn to live on better terms with our neighbors. We must win their respect and confidence again”(The Courage And Foresight of Busia 49-51).

There is something eerily familiar about the rather cynical manner in which the Nkrumah-led CPP, purporting to be fighting rank corruption, facilely scapegoated the very weak and the abjectly deprived and destitute in society. On this nauseating aspect of CPP political culture, this is what Busia had to say: “There is also the make-believe about cleaning up corruption, given publicity in the CPP press, whilst the ‘Adankos’ [rabbits] and ‘Patakus’ [wolves] and the favored few carry on extorting bribes. It is widely known that it is those who shout the loudest about being apostles of socialism who have amassed huge fortunes which they have stored abroad or used in buying palatial mansions in foreign countries. They are the ones who have drained the country of its wealth, and brought suffering to the masses. For the good of the country, and the happiness of the masses who suffer most under a corrupt government, Ghana must be saved from corruption. But the truth is that the corruption which has been allowed to grow to such menacing proportions cannot be effectively dealt with unless the cleaning starts from the top and moves downwards. It is not dealt with by exposing the weak at the bottom and protecting the strong at the top. Corruption still continues and causes injustice, inefficiency, and waste of public funds. The Government should not pretend to be stopping bribery and corruption while it passes iniquitous laws to deprive the people of their right to question its actions. ¶ It has been blatantly announced to the whole world by the dismissal of the Chief Justice, Sir Arku Korsah, the subsequent dismissals of Justice Akufo-Addo, Blay, Bossman and Prempeh, and by the law which empowers the President to appoint and dismiss Judges as he likes, and even review court decisions he disapproves, that justice and the rule of law are extinguished in Ghana in Nkrumah’s one-party regime. No citizen has protection in law against the whims of the President, however capricious and unreasonable these may be. It is not surprising that Mr. Koi Larbi, the Senior Defense Counsel in the recent treason trials, has been thrown into prison without trial. The ‘justice’ in the motto is a hollow mockery. Ghana has enthroned tyranny”(The Courage And Foresight of Busia 51-52).

On the intellectually vacuous argument of those who, like Nkrumah, have sought to justify the morally untenable one-party state and system of governance in the name of a purportedly “monolithic” organic unity of continental African history and culture, Busia has the following to say: “What the one-party has done in Ghana is to empower one man to rule absolutely, without anyone having the right to disagree with him, and without giving the people any real opportunity to change him. It has been claimed that the one-party state accords with the traditions of Ghana and that the President must be seen as a Big Chief. This is false. I challenge anyone to produce evidence from the country’s traditional institutions to substantiate the claim. Those who seek to justify tyrannical and despotic rule on the basis of our tradition do us injury, as well as insult us. Wherever you look at our traditional political institutions, whether of Ga, or Adangbe, or Krobo, or Ewe, or Akwamu, or Asante, or Fante or any of the Akan tribes; or Mamprusi, or Dagomba, or any Northern tribe; all of them, despite their diversities, had one thing in common. Each political organization brought together heads representing the interests of various groups and communities who at the Central Council protected the interests of the respective groups and communities they represented, whilst at the same time they sought agreements on the matters which concerned them as a whole. The wisdom of our ancestors lay in their ability to devise political institutions which reconciled sectional interests, multi-interest representation was a fundamental principle of our traditional political institutions. The case for monolithic one-party rule cannot be based on our tradition. It should also be noted that the traditional systems provided alternatives from which to choose; and heads, whether of families, or tribes, or chiefdoms, could be changed by those whom they represented. If we care to learn from our past, we shall find pointers to the solution of our contemporary problems of government, central as well as local. We had foundations for a democratic system of government. ¶ Everyone knows that the referendum which was supposed to have given the people’s approval to the one-party state was a fraud. Ballot papers were marked and thrown into the voting boxes for people who never voted; the ‘No’ boxes were sealed so that ballot papers could not be placed in them; the declared figures were much larger than the numbers that actually voted. The referendum was a gigantic fake. These facts were reported in the world press, and could not be challenged by the Ghana Government. It is known both outside and within Ghana that the referendum was an outrageous fraud. We of the United Party outside Ghana do not accept the results as a genuine reflection of the will of the people; they represent a fraudulent abuse of power. This is not the first time [that] elections have been rigged in Ghana; rigging elections is in accordance with the teachings of Lenin, whose avowed disciple Nkrumah is, and he has used it to keep himself in power”(The Courage And Foresight of Busia 52-55).

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D., is Associate Professor of English, Journalism and Creative Writing at Nassau Community College of the State University of New York, Garden City. He is Director of The Sintim-Aboagye Center for Politics and Culture and author of “Dr. J. B. Danquah: Architect of Modern Ghana” (iUniverse.com, 2005).

E-mail: okoampaahoofe@optimum.net

The opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views or have the endorsement of the Editorial Board of www.africanewsanalysis.com and www.africa-forum.net

The writer, Dr Michael J.K. Bokor

The still water that constitutes their party’s internal workings runs too deep for their comfort. I want to stick my neck out on this score and will definitely incur the displeasure of the NPP’s followers; but I reck little of their tantrums.

I have restrained myself from doing so for many months now, hoping that something would come from Akufo-Addo to prove me wrong. But he hasn’t been forthcoming to curtail it, his dilly-dallying holding everybody (including his own party’s fanatics) in a painful suspense.

Some are asking: So, can’t Akufo-Addo choose his Running Mate for us all to know, less than 9 months to Election 2012? What is holding him up if not the stiff opposition from the real power brokers in the NPP (the Council of Elders and moneybags bankrolling the party’s operations) to his preferred choice who—we’ve heard for more than the umpteenth time without anything from Akufo-Addo to confirm—is Dr. Mahamadu Bawumia, the political paperweight whose partnership for the 2008 polls didn’t yield anything to put Akufo-Addo in power?

Let nobody deceive himself that Akufo-Addo isn’t doing so because he is waiting for the Woyome scandal to have its full negative toll on the Mills-led government before breaking the silence (as Ben Ephson would vacuously tell us). What is it about corruption that is strange in this Woyome case to warrant its being trumpeted as President Mill’s swan song?

The most pointed question is rather: Why can’t Akufo-Addo make up his mind on who his Running Mate is? There must be something more terribly wrong than anybody will persuade me to accept as the cause of this hiccup. We’ve heard rumours on numerous occasions regarding when he would make the announcement; but those days have elapsed without anything coming from him.

Some may wonder: After all, with the current nose-dive that the Mills-led government has taken to deepen its credibility problems, isn’t it obvious that the electorate have already made up their minds to go for Akufo-Addo and his NPP whether he names his Running Mate now or on election day? Or, considering the negative public impressions about the NDC government’s performance, is there any compulsion at all for Akufo-Addo to name his Running Mate now to be able to garner public goodwill or as a prerequisite for making the NPP more attractive?

So optimistic of an Akufo-Addo victory are some of my NPP friends that they see Election 2012 as a done deal—an “Operation Cold Chop.” Is it not obvious that President Mills will be defeated, they often ask!

In other words, they see Akufo-Addo as already positioned at the vantage point to clinch electoral victory with little or no effort at all. Whether he announces his Running Mate now or not will not change his electoral fortunes, they conclude.

I see things differently. Despite all this noise being made about Akufo-Addo and the NPP’s electoral fate, I don’t think that all is well in that camp or that Ghanaians will necessarily go for him at Election 2012 to seal their anger at the incumbent’s “poor performance.”

Akufo-Addo still has some high hurdles to jump. That is why when I hear his followers glibly proclaiming that with his “experiences,” he can solve Ghana’s problems and will win the elections for that matter, I laugh out loud. Among others, the decision he makes on his Running Mate will definitely play a huge part in determining his fate.

So far, rumours point to Dr. Bawumia. The only reason being advanced in his favour is that he was Akufo-Addo’s Running Mate for the 2008 elections and that having been exposed as such, he is already known and marketing him won’t be as difficult as it would be for a new face. In this sense, then, “consistency” or “continuity” has been touted as the best principle to warrant his choice.

That is the most vacuous claim I have ever heard in politically motivated circumstances. Probably, it must have dawned on Akufo-Addo and his managers that reasons stronger than this “continuity” slogan should guide the decision to be made on a Running Mate; hence this delay.

Obviously, the most sensible factor to look for is whether the prospective candidate has any political constituency or personal capabilities to garner support for the party and its flagbearer. Again, such a candidate must have established good credentials in several domains other than what Bawumia is being credited with—as a former Deputy Governor of the Bank of Ghana.

This designation has instigated loud claims that he is an experienced economist (technocrat, for that matter) whose expertise will be tapped into by Akufo-Addo (a lawyer) for good and effective governance to facilitate Ghana’s development. Nothing could be more preposterous!

Bawumia is nowhere near the big brains in economics who have preceded him in the management of national affairs. The country has had several substantive Governors of the Bank of Ghana (John Saka Addo, Godfried Kportufe Agama, Kwabena Dufuor, among them) and renowned economists (Drs. Amon and Gloria Nikoi and Robert Gardner, among others) who played very important roles in governance but couldn’t be credited with anything significant that transformed the national economy or improved living standards. There are other economics heavyweights too. So, why elevate Bawumia to this height?

Whatever expertise he may have could be better used outside the Vice Presidency, if these NPP loud-mouths care to know. I suppose that Bawumia could continue to function his capacity as an economist in other spheres. It is not only when he becomes a Vice President that he can do so to the country’s benefit.

Probably, the fact that he is a political paperweight who hasn’t added anything new to the NPP’s arsenal to enhance its politicking must be one major reason to detract from his chances. At this point, it beats my imagination why he chose to resign his position in that lucrative assignment in Zimbabwe to await Akufo-Addo’s choice of him as his Running Mate. Whoever might have influenced him into taking that hasty action has done him a world of disservice. Or is he also already intoxicated with the potion that has made many a Ghanaian politician power-hungry and mindless of the landmines on the way to the Osu Castle?

As the dilly-dallying continues and the suspense persists, some inklings are beginning to emerge that Bawumia may not be Akufo-Addo’s choice, after all. I am beginning to have a hunch that Lepowura, Alhaji JND Jawula may emerge as Akufo-Addo’s preferred choice. If you doubt my hunch, just read between the lines to find out why Alhaji Jawula is all of a sudden full of vim, blowing hot air about the NPP’s agenda for national development. He was at the University of Cape Coast over the weekend.

I don’t think that he will be doing things just anyhow or that he is now trying to catch the power brokers’ eyes. Like the proverbial blind man threatening to stone the one taunting him, he is stepping on a piece of stone. Something is in the offing to give him that confidence and optimism. After all, he is better exposed than Bawumia and will be a better candidate to garner some support for the NPP if chosen.

Many other developments point to him as a likely choice. As we wait for Akufo-Addo to make the announcement, after all, we will continue to suggest that he will be helping his own cause if he adds value to his team by choosing those who have already wetted their feet and know how to do politics. At this point, any talk of “continuity” is hollow. But I won’t be surprised if that is what suits Akufo-Addo because, like the dog that is determined to run away from its master and, therefore, refuses to hear his whistle, he may be steeped in his stance and throw caution to the wind.

And if he does so, it will be the surest means to lose the Presidential elections again. Bawumia is a non-performing asset. For Akufo-Addo, the question is: To swerve him or not to swerve him? It is a tight knot for him to untie. How he does so will go a long way to affect his political ambitions this time round. He makes the wrong choice at his own risk. Does he have the guts to make that announcement soon?

E-mail: mjbokor@yahoo.com
Join me on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/mjkbokor
Get a copy of my novel, The Last Laugh (PublishAmerica.com, April 2009). Coming out soon: The Story of the Elephant, a novel

The opinions expressed are the author‘s and do not necessarily reflect the views or have the endorsement of the Editorial Board of www.africanewsanalysis.com and www.africa-forum.net

The writer, Dr Michael J.K. Bokor

That we haven’t had any destabilizing event such as a coup d’état since we adopted constitutional democratic rule in this 4th Republic is not because we have insulated our national politics against anything of the sort. Or, that by choosing this system of governance, we have strengthened and empowered the institutions of state to ward off any military adventurism. It is not because the civil population can prevent the soldiers from intervening in national politics. Or that Ghanaians would have the capability to neutralize any such move by soldiers.

Our democracy has survived so far only because no soldier has attempted any coup d’état. It is not because the military cannot take such an action. It may be because military coups are fast becoming unattractive throughout the world but the door is not closed to them. We have survived just because no soldier has been daring enough to take up arms to overthrow the civilian governments that we’ve had since January 1993.

Truth be told, these governments have failed in several ways to govern efficiently; to solve the problems that have crippled national development all these years; to rule with equanimity to ensure a judicious use of the country’s resources for equitable development of all regions in the country; and to galvanize the citizens into raising productivity and contributing their quota toward national development.

Largely, these governments have created anxious moments for the citizens and dampened spirits. The high incidence of bribery and corruption in public life, nepotism, cronyism, plain and objectionable tribal politics, open thievery of public funds and landed property, and many other forms of malfeasance doesn’t redound well to these governments’ integrity. Mismanagement of the national economy and manipulation of the political system to serve parochial interests have raised serious questions about them.

Before this 4th Republic, these happenings were some of the reasons that the military used to topple governments only for them to perpetrate a thousand-fold those very vices. The military have done much harm to our national life; but being wielders of the instruments of violence, they did not hesitated in the past to stamp their violent bent on the society as they acted with wanton abandon in overthrowing civilian governments.

Today, we can’t claim to have any antidote for any military adventurism in our national politics; nor can we boast of any capability to prevent one. I bet you that if any dare-devil military personnel take up arms today to overthrow the government, we can’t confront them nor can we thwart their efforts. We don’t have the means. And they will get the support they need to be in office. It is not strange!

All those in civil society loudly condemning military adventurism and vowing resistance are cowards who will be the first to either turn coat to support the soldiers or take to their heels into self-imposed exile from where they will petulantly issue empty threats and hurl the foulest insults at the new rulers, their nemesis. All to no avail, though.

We don’t have the mechanism to contain any military action against the government. The failure of our various governments since the beginning of this 4th Republic to equip and strengthen these institutions of state has made them weak and incapable of performing their functions to such an extent as to endear themselves to tax payers as reliable. They can’t help us solve our problems either.

I am raising these issues not because I anticipate or welcome any military intervention but just to make one important point that our democracy isn’t maturing to help us solve our systemic problems. Instead, it is lopsided in many aspects and creating conditions for unwanted tension and explosion in future. The people may not be able to contain all the anger any more.

Our democracy is open to abuse mostly because our politicians have persistently taken us for rough roller-coaster rides and are doing what endangers it.

We may be proud that for nearly 20 years since its inception, the 4th Republic hasn’t been threatened by any sector, particularly, the military. Our democracy has grown only in terms of the years that it has gathered; but in reality, it is not maturing with age. It still has very serious lapses that don’t seem to be recognized and tackled for it to serve the country’s interests better.

I will raise only one of those major lapses to justify my claim. The others will be touched upon in other articles.

The Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of Parliament is currently going into the Auditor-General’s Report on financial matters concerning public institutions, especially the Ministries. We have been alarmed by the circumstances surrounding the payment of judgement debts to many people (including Alfred Agbesi Woyome and the Construction Pioneers) and the role of the Office of the Attorney-General and the Ministry of Justice as well as the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning. The fraud happened to the blind side of Parliament and the flouting of orders from the Presidency!!

We hear Woyome was paid 51 million Ghana Cedis (or U.S. Dollars?). Construction Pioneers Ltd (CP) was paid 94 million Euros as settlement debts even though it was owing Ghana 284 million deutsche marks and GH¢5.2 million in tax liabilities. It didn’t pay that tax because Betty Mould-Iddrissu, former Attorney-General and Minister of Justice exercised unlimited power to waive it.

Such doubtful payments are being scrutinized by the PAC, and we cringe at revelations. At Thursday’s sitting, Albert Kan Dapaah, the Chairman of PAC, made utterances, which revealed the lapse that we can trace to our 1992 constitution and the bearing that it has on our democracy. Mr. Dapaah expressed concern that due diligence was not done; that Mould-Iddrissu acted in contravention of the Constitution.

Mr Enoch Cobbina, Chief Director of the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning, said the Ministry of Finance authorized the payment to CP based on a letter from Mould-Iddrissu because its officials were certain that she had done her homework with due diligence before sending a memo to the Ministry of Finance to pay, and they had no reason to doubt her integrity.

“At this juncture the chairman of the committee asked whether they could make payment of that colossal amount based only on the memo from the Attorney General and Minister of Justice which was signed without a witness and without a proper title, to which the Chief Director replied that, that was outside the normal practice” (Myjoyonline, March 2, 2012).

As reported, “Mr. Dapaah and the committee members were surprised that basic controls such as insisting on the provision of supporting documents before payments were made as it was the practice in the payment systems, were breached.”

Again, Mr. Dappah observed that the action by Mould-Iddrissu to waive tax was ultra vires; it breached laid-down constitutional stipulation that empowers Parliament as the only institution to do so. In other words, Mould-Iddrissu had no power to waive taxes but acting in her Ministerial capacity, she did so without Parliament’s knowledge or authorization (if anything at all).

Mould-Iddrissu flouted a constitutional provision and got away with it. Parliament got to know long after she had exercised an unlimited power to usurp its responsibility. Why should a Minister have such impunity to act that way without being checkmated by Parliament, the very institution to counter-balance the operations of the Executive arm of government?

We have many problems of this dimension to lose sleep over. Our 1992 Constitution stipulates that two-thirds of those to be appointed into Ministerial positions must come from Parliament. The framers of the Constitution haven’t explained to us why they made that stipulation. Could it be because of the need for enforcing checks and balances from within? So far, all the Presidents have followed this stipulation.

But to date, nothing by way of checks and balances has been enforced to justify the need for this stipulation. The MPs upgraded to Ministerial positions have acted in their dual capacities as legislators and members of the Executive arm of government and relish the resultant huge perks. Hindsight tells us that these MPs/Government Ministers appreciate their enhanced status and grieve very much when divested of their Ministerial appointments. What sort of democracy will even make room for such a duality?

This duality raises many questions, especially when we don’t feel its impact. Do these MPs report to Parliament on their functions as members of the Executive arm so that Parliament can exercise any oversight responsibility over what they do in public office? Or, do they in any way open their operations to Parliamentary scrutiny for us to know that they are not abusing their duality to the disadvantage of our democracy? What is the benefit of a legislator serving as a member of the Executive arm simultaneously?

In the case of appointees like Betty Mould-Iddrissu who were not picked from Parliament for Ministerial appointments, what is Parliament’s relationship with them? How does Parliament monitor what they do to prevent such damaging unilateral decisions of the kind made by Mould-Iddrissu, which have harmed the national economy so terribly? Or is it just a case of vetting and approving their nomination only to let them loose into the comfort of their offices to manipulate the system?

From what has happened so far, we can conclude that Parliament was left out of the loop and is now probing this malfeasance long after the harm had been inflicted on all of us. Shouldn’t it have been better to prevent such malfeasance instead? How does Parliament hope to do so in future?

As we grieve over this fraud in respect of the payment of judgement debts, what guarantee is there that others are not being hatched or that the open-ended authority that a Minister exercises is being monitored and controlled?

Now, to the Presidency. What mechanism is in place to ensure that Cabinet scrutinizes the operations of its members or Ministries/Departments/Agencies acting on behalf of the Executive? From what has happened in the Woyome and CP scandals, we can tell that neither the Cabinet nor the President acted responsibly to curb the wanton exercise of self-constituted power by Betty Mould-Iddrissu. For how long must this irresponsible behaviour continue to harm the national interests?

These lapses are troubling. They negate our democracy and open it to abuse. As presently configured, our democracy fails to serve our utmost interests. It works better for the politicians than the mass of citizens.

I hope the Constitution Review Commission saw this problem too and recommended workable solutions for it. What is left now is for us to review the 1992 Constitution to eliminate such pitfalls. But looking at what is happening in the country, I have serious doubts whether there will ever be any referendum to that effect.

Those who benefit from the loopholes in the Constitution are too comfortably and rigidly ensconced in their positions of power and advantage to do anything to topple themselves or endanger their well-being. In the workings of these self-seeking politicians, nothing of the sort will happen. They are too comfortable, functioning with these loopholes, to effect any change. They are wary of anything new that doesn’t create opportunities for them to exploit. That is their boon and our doom!

E-mail: mjbokor@yahoo.com
Join me on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/mjkbokor
Get a copy of my novel, The Last Laugh (PublishAmerica.com, April 2009)

The opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views or havethe endorsement of the Editorial Board of www.africanewsanalysis.com and www.africa-forum.net

Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, NPP presidential aspirant

He promised that he would only work with people who are committed to working to enrich the lives of ordinary Ghanaians. Nana Addo was speaking at a breakfast meeting with the United Kingdom Chapter of the Young Executives Forum (YEF) of the NPP at the Grosvenor House in London.

“My message to any of you, or anybody for that matter who wishes to serve in an Akufo-Addo government is this: if you want to make money then forget it. We don’t need you and we don’t want you.”

He went on to explain, “If you want to make money, I am all for making legitimate money; but, if you want to make money then, please, don’t come into politics. if you want to make money then the private sector is your place. Stay there and keep away from politics.”

According to the NPP Presidential candidate whose is sure of the party’s victory in December, the culture where people choose politics as a money-making venture or career must be fought and defeated, it is frustrating the development of the country and breeding poverty.

He observed, “Ghana is not poor, Ghanaians are not poor, what makes the nation so poor is poor management of the nation’s resources. We defeat poor management first and foremost by getting the right people in place.”

Explaining why he chose to be a politician, he said, “I chose politics because I want to serve; I chose politics because I believe I can play a leading role to create opportunities for everyone and raise the living standards of our people; If money-making was my motivation, I would have stayed in my successful private practice as a lawyer and take fat legal fees.”

Akufo-Addo also told his audience of professional Ghanaians who hosted him at the exclusive place at Park Lane, Central London, that the fight against corruption must be fought on two main fronts: “One, strengthening, empowering and freeing up the institutions of state to deliver efficiently on their mandate and; two, for those at the top to lead by example. I will lead by example.”

He further stated, “By God’s grace, if we are successful in this year’s election, I want to attract to government a good blend of committed, competent Ghanaians, from home and abroad, experienced and creative, dynamic and dependable. We want to put together a team of patriots who can deliver and will get their biggest thrill from delivering on our programmes for people and country and not in enriching their pockets.”

“Transforming our economy, from a raw material producing one, to an industrial one, where our foreign receipts will rather come from the export of value added products and not raw materials, remains my goal,” Nana Addo pledged.

He emphasized “Providing free, quality, accessible education up to senior high school for all our country’s people will be a major component of that transformation.”

The NPP disclosed, “Going around the country, meeting and interacting with people, one can sense the high levels of despondency and disappointment in this NDC administration, and the Ghanaian people are looking to us in the NPP to come and save them.”

He attributed the nation’s under-development to factors including, outlined growing unemployment, collapsing businesses, widespread poverty, access to and cost of quality education and corruption amongst.

He however stated, “When the NPP returns to power in 2013, by the grace of God, we will build on the gains of President Kufuor’s regime and move Ghana forward.”

He repeated that his political opponent’s continuous fabrications, insults and attacks on his person do not bother him at all.

“The NPP has given me a duty to win back power from the NDC in order to restore hope to our country and that remains my focus; as for the insults and lies, it is just a small price I’m paying for putting myself up to serve my people and that does not worry me at all.” he said.

He continued that the NDC have also resorted to attacking his person because they do not have a message to tell the electorate.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

But I would even go further by pleading with the prime movers of our judicial system to impose the stiffest of punitive damages on Mr. Woyome and each and every one of his criminal associates and accomplices. For, as clearly underscored in a previous commentary on the issue, what the prime criminal suspect did morally and materially (or practically) amounts to the brazen and blatant bankrupting of our economy, and thus the premeditated overthrow of the Government of Ghana, and the destruction of the country at large!

But that some key and prominent operatives of the Atta-Mills government of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) evidently collaborated with the suspect in bilking the people, is all the more troubling. And, of course, what the foregoing means is that both our legal and judicial instruments must be relentlessly put to the service of bringing each and every one of these cardinal executive officers who is forensically proven to have actively participated in this grand scheme of defrauding the State of Ghana to the phantasmagorical tune of GH ¢ 51 million to book, and promptly so!

And on the preceding score must be vividly recalled the fact that in his press statement Mr. Amidu, finally and refreshingly, names names, as it were; and predictably, those names include Mr. Samuel Nerquaye-Tetteh, the Chief State Attorney presently in charge of the Woyome case, and Mr. Cecil Adadevoh, the Senior State Attorney, both of whom, according to the former Attorney-General, unsuccessfully attempted to prevail upon Mr. Amidu to order the payment of an additional GH ¢ 9 million in the form of a forensically provable nonexistent accumulated interest on the ill-gotten GH ¢ 51 million.

If, indeed, the foregoing assertion has validity, and there is absolutely no reason, thus far, to contradict the same, then it clearly appears to me that both Messrs. Nerquaye-Tetteh and Adadevoh ought to immediately and unreservedly recuse themselves from the prosecution side of the Woyome Scandal, tender their resignation to President John Evans Atta-Mills or have the latter promptly remove these two personalities-of-interest from their posts, and ask them to prepare to face the inexorable music and sound of justice. Anything short of the preceding would be tantamount to the kind of judicial travesty to which Mr. Amidu alluded in his press statement.

Indeed, about the only aspect of his argument on which I beg to mildly differ with the ex-Attorney-General, regards the utmost significance of time in both the preparation and prosecution of the Woyome Outrage. Clearly, Mr. Amidu appears to have Election 2012 in mind, especially regarding the critical question of how to both bring the prime suspect to book without irreparably aborting even the flimsiest of shots at an electoral victory, and also using the judicial process to score some vital, if not prime, political points. Fat chance, I say.

I, on the other hand, rather prefer to envisage the prosecution of the Woyome Scandal in terms of “deliberate haste.” In brief, what I mean by the latter phrase is simply that, indeed, while expeditiousness is central to judicial efficiency, thus Mr. Amidu’s all-too-apt allusion of “time” as “being of the essence,” nevertheless, the imperative need for qualitative judicial dispensation cannot be impugned.

In a general sense, however, Mr. Amidu seems to perfectly agree with me, thus his rather bold and prompt expression of chagrin with the present cast of prosecutors. The former Chief-Government-Lawyer is also dead-on accurate in characterizing the unconscionable “Trokosi Boys,” who operate such cancerous NDC scandal sheets as the Daily Post, as a bunch of “politically immature and ignorant” Amen-Corner Chorus in the dubious service of their executive paymasters.

Still, unlike Mr. Amidu, I firmly believe that the Woyome Scandal extends far beyond the mere refund of a criminally extorted judgment-debt payment. And as even the former A-G, himself, was quick to point out in his press statement, vis-à-vis the summary execution by firing squad, by Messrs. Rawlings and Boakye-Djan, of leaders like Messrs. Yaw Boakye, Utuka, Amedume and Felli, among others, the need for condign justice is what is unimpeachably at stake here. And Ghanaians, as a collective, have an obligation to both the fulfillment of our national conscience, as well as the protection of our youth and posterity from malignant social tumors as Mr. Woyome and his criminal associates.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D., is Associate Professor of English, Journalism and Creative Writing at Nassau Community College of the State University of New York, Garden City. He is Director of The Sintim-Aboagye Center for Politics and Culture and author of “The New Scapegoats: Colored-on-Black Racism” (iUniverse.com, 2005).

E-mail: okoampaahoofe@optimum.net

The opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views or have the endorsement of the Editorial Board of www.africanewsanalysis.com and www.africa-forum.net

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

For starters, the joint call by Barima Mintah-Afari II and Nana Opoku-Ababio appears to be a thinly veiled insidious attempt at calling in what these patently misguided traditional rulers envisage to be a favor uniquely owed them and the people of Brong-Ahafo, merely because in the lead-up to the 1969 general election, or thereabouts, conducted by the Afrifa-led National Liberation Council (NLC), Dr. Kofi Abrefa Busia, the prime-ministerial candidate of the erstwhile Progress Party (PP), had appointed Justice Edward Akufo-Addo, the father of the current NPP presidential candidate, as his ceremonial president. The call of the chiefs is thus a lurid and immitigably unconscionable attempt to compromise both the ideological and moral integrity of Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo. It also myopically overlooks the fact that the proverbial Danquah-Busia Tradition is none the least bit predicated on raw and naked nepotism but, rather, the immutable democratic principle of equity and fairness.

Then also must be unreservedly emphasized the fact that the Danquah-Busia Tradition is an inclusive political tent encompassing the equal participation of all Ghanaian citizens from all ten regions of the country, without any fear or favor. Indeed, by so deviously and mischievously attempting to finesse the “Dombo Factor” out of the Danquah-Busia Tradition, Barima Mintah-Afari II and Nana Opoku-Ababio appear to be either wittingly or unwittingly, but definitely selfishly, playing the good fortunes of the New Patriotic Party, in the heated lead-up to Election 2012, into the hands of those cynics who have been adamantly insisting, since the beginning of Ghana’s Fourth Republic, that the NPP is, somehow, the exclusive preserve of Ghanaian citizens of Akan descent. It is, indeed, on this score that the latest call by these two Brong-Ahafo chiefs, as well as that of Nana Asante-Boateng IV, the Apagyahene of Fiapre, ought to be roundly condemned.

To be certain, it would not come as any surprise, at all, if these three chiefs are later discovered to be card-carrying members of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC), deliberately set up to psychologically stampede Nana Akufo-Addo and prevent the NPP flagbearer from realizing his hard-fought presidential ambition. It is also not clear what the three Brong-Ahafo chiefs mean when they contradictorily claim that no citizen from their region has served in the executive branch in the cabinets of either the NDC or NPP governments, and then turn round to also confidently and proudly claim that almost every individual Brong-Ahafo citizen who has served as a minister of state in either the Kufuor and/or the Rawlings-Mills administrations has acquitted him-/herself creditably.

And, indeed, were these chiefs no “greedy bastards,” perhaps, they would have been wise enough to seriously question why, for instance, no Ghanaian citizen of Ga-Adangbe descent, two of whose kinsmen were among the ranks of the legendary Big Six, has ever been elected as either President of Ghana or the Presidential Candidate/running-mate of either major political party.

That Barima Mintah-Afari II and Nana Opoku-Ababio both hail from the Sunyani-West District, long represented in Ghana’s Parliament by Mr. J. H. Mensah, a former senior minister and presidential right-hand man in the Kufuor government, is absolutely no coincidence at all. Not very long ago, for instance, Mr. Mensah, who is also the brother-in-law of former President John Agyekum-Kufuor, made a similar curiously tendentious judgment call. Remarkably and predictably, the former Minister of Finance and Economic Planning under Prime Minister Busia at the time, cynically couched his equally prejudicial call in dubious terms of competence even, while like the three Brong-Ahafo chiefs herein referenced, pretending to cavalierly ignore the time-tested and globally affirmed significance of regional balance in the selection of a running-mate.

It is also rather disingenuous for the three Brong-Ahafo chiefs to pretend that the selection, or choosing, of role models by Ghanaian youths is a purely regional or ethnocentric affair. And here, perhaps, it bears recalling for the moral edification of Barima Mintah-Afari, Nana Opoku-Ababio and, of course, Nana Asante-Boateng that while growing up under the Busia government, this writer readily identified with Ghana’s Oxbridge scholar-Prime Minister without any thought of whether Dr. Busia was a Brong native or a non-Akyem native. To be certain, back then, I had absolutely no idea, whatsoever, of my being related to the legendary likes of Drs. J. B. Danquah and Jones Ofori-Atta and even President Edward Akufo-Addo and Mr. William (Paa Willie) Ofori-Atta. And there, of course, was a reason for such anomaly: my own father was a dyed-in-the-wool CPP operative. Not that becoming aware of the fact of these illustrious Ghanaian leaders having been my blood relatives would have made much of a difference. After all, the onus of raising me to become a successful and responsible Ghanaian citizen still squarely rested on the shoulders of my own parents and maternal grandparents!

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D., is Associate Professor of English, Journalism and Creative Writing at Nassau Community College of the State University of New York, Garden City. He is Director of The Sintim-Aboagye Center for Politics and Culture and author of “Dr. J. B. Danquah: Architect of Modern Ghana” (iUniverse.com, 2005).

E-mail: okoampaahoofe@optimum.net

The opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views or have the endorsement of the Editorial Board of www.africanewsanalysis.com and www.africa-forum.net

The writer, Dr Michael J.K. Bokor

Mine is not an opinion poll nor is it intended to be viewed as anything empirical. It is just an attempt to assess President Mills’ estimation in the eyes of those who “respond” to anything said or written about him. Such an assessment has its limitations but can help us know how the diverse impressions that people have about President Mills shape attitudes to him and how such impressions may influence electoral decisions.
It will also provide opportunities for a sneak peek into the near future as far as his political fortunes are concerned. Reaction to other articles on President Mills also inform us about such perceptions. The larger picture may lie elsewhere; but, at least, we can see a part of it at this time through the opinions of these respondents.

Even if the corpus of data used for this analysis is too small to be accepted as a credible representation of voter sentiments against President Mills, it does reflect reality to a limited extent to make us know how people feel about him. We must, therefore, not dismiss such opinions as a mere bother or as misplaced sentiments of hatred on the part of frustrated political opponents.

I acknowledge that in an election year, an analysis of this sort is relevant because it will help us begin to weigh issues to see how the tide flows. Of course, President Mills is seeking re-election and we need to know how he stands in the estimation of the people. That’s why it is important to test the pulse with issues of the sort that my article raised to stoke the fire of public discourse. The conversation goes on and we need to pause for reflection even as we continue to monitor the ebb and flow of the discourse on Election 2012.
After all, fetish priests and other Messengers of God have already blazed the trail to forewarn us of a violence-prone election period even as they claim to know in advance who the winners will be but won’t tell us. Our own analysis of issues can lead us to better conclusions than what appears to be coming from a spiritual realm that has nothing to do with general elections!

It is commonly said that a physical problem is solved physically and a spiritual one spiritually. A general election is a physical issue, not a spiritual problem to be solved spiritually. But our Ghanaian Men of Spirits think they know better. I won’t allow myself to be hoodwinked into believing them and will use evidence from the people’s sentiments to gauge the political temperature.

THE CORPUS OF COMMENTS

In all, 87 comments came from readers who accessed my article at the major Web sites (Ghanaweb.com, Myjoyonline, PeacefmOnline, ModernGhana.com). About 24 hours after the article was published, a visit to those Websites showed the following: PeacefmOnline recorded 41 comments from visitors; Ghanaweb.com, 44; MyjoyOnline, 14; andModernGhana.com, 1. In addition, I had one personal e-mail from a reader.

Although that article was carried by other Web sites (including AfricaNewsAnalysis.com, Okromouth.com, VibeGhana.com, IndepthAfrica.com, SpyGhana.com, among others), it didn’t attract as many vitriolic comments as came from the major Web sites mentioned above.

I recognize the fact that the article also attracted comments on Facebook and personal blogs that carried it. Other possibilities such as readers e-mailing the article to their friends and relatives could also be considered, even though responses were not available to gather and assess. It is possible too that not all readers commented on the article or because of censorship by the moderator (Myjoyonline.com, for instance), not all comments were published. I will, therefore, concentrate on only comments gathered from the major Web sites as published verbatim.

THE RESULTS

Three main categories of comments were recorded: negative, positive, and a mixture of negative and positive (middle-of-the-road) comments. The latter may not necessarily qualify as “neutral” because of hidden implications suggesting the presence of something negative or positive, even if not pronounced.

1. NEGATIVE COMMENTS

I qualify as negative any comment that disparages President Mills and doesn’t suggest any positive appreciation for him (as a person), his office (the Presidency), or performance (acts of omission or commission). High on the list of comments in this category are outright insults (whether directly framed, using the obvious expletive or pejorative language), aspersions, insinuations, innuendoes, or metaphorical expressions that undermine and not give positive reinforcement.

Some of the words and expressions highlighting this stance included “incompetent,” “hypocrite,” “visionless,” “powerless, “sick,” “useless,” “foolish,” “timid,” “weak,” “insensitive,” and “feckless.”

This category also included comments that sought to blame President Mills for whatever lapses the readers noticed in his government. Of all, direct/outright insults dominated. Examples included:

• “as the most hypocritical, vision-less, powerless, sick, useless president we’ve ever had in ghana…. Foolish man….”;

• “… it is very simple the president has done something great we will always remember him as ecomini and omama .infact he is the most useless president ever in this world”; and

• “He will be remembered as the worst president Ghana has ever had. He is weak mentally and practically ineffective, he has wasted our time” (PeacefmOnline).

Other comments verged on ill-wish for President Mills, as we can see from this example: “…I also be happy seen him in hell fire burning with his coleagues like Abacha,Idi Aminu,Mogabe,Kwaku Bonsam and some of the pastors around the would who are fucking people’s wives and extorting money from innocent people to enrich themselves… and those from NPP who also stole from the poor Ghanaian tax payers… Fire Burn them all.”

1. POSITIVE COMMENTS

Comments that qualify as positive are identified as words (adjectives, especially) and other forms of language use that project President Mills in a positive light. Such words/expressions (descriptive) sought to ensure a positive face-marking for him. They concluded the following:

• “… as father for all. oppositon go shy”;

• “People say Mills is a Failure but I think it was not all his fault. The Greedy Rwalings made him fail as he took his eyes off the ball to deal with JJ greed. NDC will go out but Mills will be remembered as the peaceful one” ; and

• “A president that has preserved the peace in our dear country. A president who has been able to acquire funds for development when Europe couldn’t. Jehovah’s blessing on him. More wisdom to ran the affairs of the country. God bless Ghana” (PeacefmOnline).

The one e-mail that I received from a reader had this: “oh that is good to hear, the massive infrastructure development economic growth, inflation, ssss, sada and ultra modern hospital in the north in tamale assembly hole complex which is near finishing…. infarct president mills is one of the best leader we have.”

2. MIDDLE-OF-THE-ROAD COMMENTS

There was another category that is a blend of both negative and positive. In such comments, the readers made disparaging comments but tended to tone down on them by injecting some positive elements into them. They were mixed feelings, for example:

• “i will remember Atta Mills as a visionless president. he is unable to articulate his vision and dreams and stir up the citizenry for a common good or purpose. indeed for someone who is striving for a better Ghana Agenda, no one seems to know what he means by that much more to understand him. his lack of control over his ministers and other government appointees is sickening. my conclusion is that Atta Mills might be a good man but he is not a good leader.”

• “I’ll remember him as the good man in the wrong party. It’s difficult to be the white sheep among a predominantly black sheep party.”

This middle-of-the-road category also showed that some respondents didn’t take sides but rather sought to comment on the comments being passed. For example, “Please have respect for the elderly,stop the insults its not helping us as a nation. No one knows the future can u guys insult your parents the way u doing to this man? pls pls pls lets stop now” (PeaceFmOnline)

Continued in the next installment…

• E-mail: mjbokor@yahoo.com
• Join me on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/mjkbokor
• Get a copy of my novel, The Last Laugh (PublishAmerica.com, April 2009)

The opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views or have the endorsement of the Editorial Board of www.africanewsanalysis.com and www.africa-forum.net

The writer, Dr Michael J.K. Bokor

3. TITLES GIVEN TO THE COMMENTS

All the responses had specific titles that had a bearing on the actual comments themselves as passed. Peculiarly, the tone of these titles didn’t diverge in any way from that of the contents of the comments. A negative title corresponded with a negative comment and vice versa.

Examples of the 32 out of the 34 titles recorded on Ghanaweb portraying negative sentiments against President Mills included: “A liar and a lazy thief”; “As the Greatest ‘DIVISOR’”; “absolutely a shambolic president”; “Disgraceful President Ever”; “Mr. Promises”; “The visionless and corrupt leader”; “An incarnate Ewe disguised as Fante”; and “Ghana’s waterloo President.”

Of the 34 comments, only two had titles with positive connotations: “Mills is 1 of the best Presidents of Africa”; and “The man who positively changed my destiny.”

In most cases, the titles related directly to the import of the comments; both converged semantically to portray the respondent as either disparaging or praising President Mills depending on what the comment entailed. At a glance, one could tell that the title encapsulated the message contained in the actual comment. Generally, the title alone was enough to convey the respondent’s sentiments.

ANALYSIS OF THE RESULTS

In analyzing the comments, I have chosen only those that convey the sharpest impressions; almost all of them (especially those with negative import) suggest an overwhelming condemnation of President Mills in several respects. Whether related to his personality, the office he occupies, or his performance, those negative comments resoundingly portrayed him as incompetent, a hypocrite, and visionless leader who shouldn’t be retained in office. These are powerful impressions.

From the corpus of comments, I could deduce that the respondents tilted more toward a disapprobation for President Mills’ performance than his personality or the office that he occupies, although some of the responses connected his foibles and frailties as a person to the office he occupies and their consequent negative impact on his performance. It is an intricate web.

Some of the specific comments make clear how the respondents focused on particular aspects to authenticate their poor opinions about President Mills. The majority of them quickly wrote President Mills off in different ways. For example: “Remember?ARE YOU KIDDING ME?This President will not be remembered for anything;In fact we will completely delete him from our memory banks” (PeaceFmOnline).

The data showed that most of those who commented negatively on President Mills based their viewpoints on specific aspects of his personality, the office he occupies, and his performance. Those related to his personality and the office he occupies were outright verbal attacks. For example, this one comment: “LLAAAAAAZZZZZZZZZZZYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY” (PeacefmOnline).

Prominent perspectives on these negative comments are encapsulated as follows:

i. Insults related to failure to fulfill Electioneering campaign promises

The quantum of insults in this regard suggest that the respondents were not satisfied that after glibly making promises all over the place to win voter confidence, President Mills couldn’t fulfill them to warrant a retention of the mandate he had secured at the 2008 polls. The implication is that his inability to fulfill such promises will undo him.

For example, “I will remember as the worst president in the history of Ghana- with lies and general wekness… I voted for him b’cos he promise to cut down a a gln of petro to ghc 2.50 but he rather recorded the highest price of ghc 8.00 in our history – so he go and good riddance” (Myjoyonline).

The respondents didn’t give any reason to explain why he couldn’t fulfill those promises nor did they attempt to rationalize the problem on the basis of the weak national economy, which might not allow for those promises to be made good.

If anything at all, the lesson from this aspect of the reaction must be obvious and learnt by the politicians seeking power, not President Mills alone. Promise-making may make or break their backs at the elections. Those who mount podiums to base their campaigns on promises had better think twice. The awakening is high that voters can now separate the wheat from the chaff and punish political office seekers on the basis of the promises they want to make as vote-winning moves.

President Mills particularly should learn the lesson too as he prepares to dive deep into the campaign mood. What he can do to make amends lies in his own hands. No more promises? Or find better ways to make them, yet based on conditions? It’s a conundrum!!

ii. Political Undertones

The political undertones of these comments betray the political persuasion of most of the respondents, especially those who castigated President Mills on the basis of political differences. Those respondents identified themselves in plain language as political opponents. The most ubiquitous were those calling themselves NPP followers, sympathizers, or activists.

They were brazen in their personal attacks and made no secret of their ill-wish for President Mills. Some even went to the extent of justifying their scathing comments on the basis of the threats that they perceived from President Mills’ spokesmen whom they accused of “hijacking” officialdom to tyrannize political opponents and to undermine their Presidential Candidate, Akufo-Addo.

The comments showed that others disapproving of President Mills’ performance might not be NDC supporters even though they didn’t disclose their true identities. The import of their comments gave them away as members of political parties opposed to the NDC (probably, the PNC, CPP, or any other).

i. Other Aspects of the Comments

Some of the respondents also directed their comments at me, making obvious their sentiments. These comments covered similar angles as they did to President Mills—insults and insinuations verging on lamentations as a demonstration of frustration that my favourite politician (President Mills) had failed; hence, my being unsettled.

Others turned their dagger on me and accused me of being his lackey and failing to acknowledge his weaknesses long ago only to turn round now to do so because of my apprehension that he would lose the elections—as if I have anything personal to gain or lose from that event.

I consider these comments as inconsequential and will let them pass off without any interpretation; but they reflect the general unfavourable perceptions of those opposed to anything NDC. I wonder why they would hasten to label me as an NDC member without any valid evidence. It’s their own cup of tea, though.

Continued in the next installment…

• E-mail: mjbokor@yahoo.com
• Join me on Facebook at: http://www.facebook.com/mjkbokor
• Get a copy of my novel, The Last Laugh (PublishAmerica.com, April 2009)

The opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views or have the endorsement of the Editorial Board of www.africanewsanalysis.com and www.africa-forum.net