As we have noted ad nauseam, whoever Candidate John Dramani Mahama settles upon as his choice of a running-mate for the 2020 Presidential Election has far relevance than his own governance-performance record or track-record as former President of the Sovereign Democratic Republic of Ghana. The problem with the supposed shortlist that was published by the passionately pro-National Democratic Congress’ rug that is parenthetically referenced in the present column, is that nearly every one of the possible choices of Mr. Mahama’s running-mate, about six candidates in all, has been part and parcel of the rank corruption and socioeconomic and moral regression that were the hallmarks of the previous National Democratic Congress’ regime.
You see, vacuously touting the academic and professional credentials of Messrs. Alex (Kofi Mensah) Mould, for example, does not hold a drop of water, because Mr. Mould, as Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), as reliably recounted by the New Patriotic Party (NPP) insider, Mr. Kennedy Ohene Agyapong, cut some of the most scandalous energy deals with the government of Equatorial Guinea which had to be drastically renegotiated down to nearly half of the original contractual deal by President Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo and his crackerjack team of energy wonks. Age aside, and that is the reckoning of the Mahama Posse itself, we are informed, Dr. Kwesi Botchwey, an Ewe transplant of the Central Region, spent 11 years with the Jerry John Rawlings-led junta of the Provisional National Defense Council (PNDC) effectively grinding Ghana’s economy to a screeching halt, and fled Ghana with his white-American paramour, an employee of the US Consulate in Ghana, after hanging the economically regressive and morally and psychologically stultifying necklace of the infamous Bretton-Woods-cooked Structural Adjustment Program (SAP) around the necks of the extremely emaciated Ghanaian citizenry.
Mr. Kwesi Ahwoi, another of the allegedly shortlisted vice-presidential candidates, is as grossly incompetent as Little Dramani himself. As Minister for Food and Agriculture, as I vividly recall, the youngest of the three infamous Ahwoi Brothers, was a complete washout, a total failure. As well, as Ghana’s Chief Diplomat or High Commissioner to South Africa, the man was scandalously AWOL amidst the rampant killings of indigenous West African migrants, mainly Ghanaians and Nigerians. Kwesi Ahwoi did absolutely nothing to intercede on behalf of Ghanaians trapped in the throes of a Winnie Mandela-type “Necklacing” in the South African townships and cities. On the other hand, the possible choice of Dr. Kwabena Duffuor, the Atta-Mills-named Finance Minister, may clearly be an insulting ploy aimed at getting some cheap votes from the Asante Region. We are all fully aware of the fact that the newly named President John Dramani Mahama, perhaps vindictively, indicated right from the get-go that he had absolutely no use for the banker and businessman by promptly kicking the butts of Dr. Duffuor to the curb, in New Yorkese.
As well, Prof. Jane Naana Opoku-Agyeman, the former Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cape Coast (UCC), was an apocalyptic disaster as Education Minister in the Mahama government. Indeed, it was during her tenure as Education Minister that the age-old Teacher-Trainees’ Allowances were summarily revoked in order to ensure, as Ghanaians were later to find out, that all the Mahama cabinet appointees, in particular those who “served” as both ministers and parliamentarians, took home double salaries every month. It was also under the tenure of Prof. Naana Opoku-Agyeman that common chalk for teaching our basic school pupils and toddlers became the rarest commodity in the country. Then also, out of the twelve months of the year, teachers were regularly being paid for only three months; I mean Little Dramani’s running-mate is the road-sign equivalent of the HUMAN SKULL WITH THE CROSS-BONES AS THE BACKGROUND OR UNDERNEATH THE SKULL. She is as incompetently wicked as the man who selected her as his running-mate. As merciless as THE POTROASE HAIR-PIN CURSE OR ROAD-BEND. This wicked pair deserves one another.
Ultimately, what matters to the Ghanaian electorate most in the leadup to the 2020 Presidential Election is which of the governments of the country’s two major political parties has performed better in the critical sectors of Education, Healthcare, vis-à-vis the general accessibility of affordable healthcare and education to the economically marginalized and totally deprived. As well, the relative performances of both parties in the areas of public transportation, both road transport and railroad development, the energy and auto industry, food and agriculture, sanitation and the environment. As I observed in a previous column, general speaking, the portfolio of Vice-President in the National Democratic Congress, even as Mrs. Matilda Amissah-Arthur authoritatively tells it, is far more miserable than the “portfolio” of a regular Houseboy.
So, yes, contrary to what NDC propagandists would have the rest of us believe, most Ghanaians are not holding their breaths for the “unveiling” or the “outdooring” of the Number-Two Man or Woman, for that matter, of the most thoroughgoing corrupt ideological and political machine and/or establishment in the country.
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