*Akua Bonsu [email protected] *
In politics few ironies are funnier than the turtle calling someone slow or an Okukuseku calling someone ugly. Deputy Minister (and it’s a miracle how he got that position) Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa called the NPP Chairman Jake Obetsebi Lamptey an actor who deserves an award. What role did the esteemed Chairman play? He joined in a national public outcry against his loose canon NDC counterpart who last week threatened our nation’s judiciary. But interestingly, a look at Obetsebi Lamptey and Ablakwa shows clearly who is the actor – a two bit actor at that.
Jake Obetsebi Lamptey was elected just six months ago as Chairman of the NPP. He inherited a party that had suffered an electoral defeat but had resiliently retooled itself to ensure that the selection of its leaders was done in a democratic manner. Within five months, the NPP Chairman showed incredible leadership as he led the planning and flawless execution of a party primaries that is now not only the envy of other Ghanaian parties, but has set the standard all across the continent of Africa regarding intra party politics democracy.
Obetsebi Lamptey’s staunch belief in the independence of the judiciary is what drove him to join intelligent and peace loving Ghanaians to rally in support of the judiciary and push back at the NDC’s familiar attempt at intimidating the judiciary. If he is an actor for protecting our democracy, then all members of the Ghana Bar Association, the Judges’ Association, and other intellectual luminaries across our country are also actors.
Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, on the other hand, has been a pretender all his life. While he pretended to go to school, he was known to break into people’s cars, a hobby apparently more important to him than the degree he signed up for. As a student, he was expelled from the NPP Tescon because his behavior was incompatible with the sanity that characterized party members’ behavior. Not surprisingly, he did not obtain his degree until after he undeservingly picked up the position of Deputy Minister of Information.
Okudzeto Ablakwa is the epitome of the Mills cabinet that the president himself has acknowledged as Team B. on this team, the president pretends to run the country, the Attorney General pretends to prosecute bad cases, and Deputy Minister of Information Ablakwa pretends to have information at his disposal. He rarely makes sense when he again pretends to speak for the government in suspect language. He does not understand the magnitude of the position he occupies, nor does he understand the issues enough to articulate them coherently. Even some JSS students have been known to articulate issues more clearly than the pretentious deputy minister of information who does not have the right information half of the times.
So if Ghanaians want to know who is really acting, they should look no further than the unqualified Deputy Minister of Information Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa. In his ‘acting’ capacity as deputy minister, so immature for the position is he that the government dares not send him on foreign trips lest he misrepresents the sophistication that Ghana has built around her image over the years. Twenty months into the Mills administration, if there was an award to be given to the one official who has been the best ‘actor’ albeit among mediocre actors, my vote goes to Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa.