By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.
Garden City, New York
Jan. 15, 2015
E-mail: [email protected]
I don't know what the rules of active political engagement in Ghana are, but it well appears to me that the Coordinator of the National Disaster Management Organization (NADMO), Mr. Kofi Portuphy, ought to have been forced to resign his post the very moment that he publicly declared his intention to vie for the prime position of National Chairman of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC). The two positions are diametrically incompatible, as we have been alerted to by several constitution-savvy Ghanaian citizens, including Dr. Richard Amoako-Baah of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), Kumasi (See "Sack Portuphy Or Face Me In Court - Amoako-Baah To Gov't" Citifmonline.com / Ghanaweb.com 1/15/15).
According to the KNUST political scientist, Mr. Portuphy's continuous stay in office as NADMO chief grossly violates some tenets of the country's 1992 Republican Constitution. I partly subscribe to Dr. Amoako-Baah's argument and hasten to add that the National Democratic Congress has a bounden obligation to promptly and unreservedly rescind the validity of the election of Mr. Portuphy as its National Chairman. Indeed, as of this writing, some vocal and leading members of the NDC had called for the forcible resignation of Mr. Portuphy as NADMO chief, if the latter proves not to be amenable to common sense and constitutional protocol.
I also see raw greed as the sole motivation for Mr. Portuphy's apparent refusal to honorably resign one of his posts. It is also quite clear to me, even from my distant perch off stateside, that Mr. Portuphy abjectly lacks the non-partisan integrity required of him as head of one of the country's most significant institutions of first responders. For at least two years, for instance, the NADMO chief permitted the appointment of Ms. Anita D'Souza as his deputy, knowing full-well that the then-NDC National Women's Organizer was grossly unqualified, totally inexperienced and irredeemably incompetent for the job.
Now, what is interesting and significant to observe here is that Mr. Portuphy never let on this fact vis-a-vis the gross administrative incompetence of Ms. D'Souza, until the latter made public her intention of succeeding Mr. Portuphy. And now, it clearly appears that the NADMO capo fiercely fought to succeed Dr. Kwabena Adjei primarily as as means of exponentially augmenting the size of his salary. What is more, both the positions of NADMO Coordinator and NDC National Chairman are full-time occupations, and so it is not clear precisely how Mr. Portuphy can be expected to creditably acquit himself in both administrative capacities.
Equally significant, of course, is the apparent hypocrisy of those now calling for the immediate resignation of the NADMO chief's gaping failure to have opportunely called for the preemptive disqualification of Ms. D'Souza, who was appointed Deputy NADMO Chief, by President Mahama, while Ms. D'Souza also actively served as the National Women's Organizer of the National Democratic Congress. I don't know what the Constitution has to say about the appointment of Ms. D'Souza as Deputy NADMO Chief, but it conceivably appears to me that Mr. Portuphy's recalcitrance may be partially predicated upon what might be aptly termed as the D'Souza Precedent.
Ultimately, what is incontrovertibly at issue here is the imperative need for frontline party apparatchiks to have their positions clearly delineated from that of appointees of the Mahama government. For, it goes without saying that the Mahama-led government of the National Democratic Congress is not one and the same as the political party called the National Democratic Congress, irrespective of the latter's having legally served as the vehicle for the election of President John Dramani Mahama and his government of NDC-affiliated cabinet appointees and other executive operatives.
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