Kennedy Ohene Agyapong, MP for Assin Central
By: Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe
I pretty much understand and fully appreciate what the firebrand Member of Parliament for Assin-Central means, when Mr. Kennedy Ohene Agyapong says that he pities the now-President Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo for being saddled with the needs, burdens and aspirations of the very people, most of them registered and card-carrying members of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), who moved tooth and nail to ensure that Nana Akufo-Addo never acceded to the presidency (See “I Pity Akufo-Addo – Kennedy Agyapong” Adomonline.com / Ghanaweb.com 3/28/17).
Needless to say, it is in the nature of humans to work vigorously and assiduously against their own best interests, especially when their choice of party and/or political leader fails to meet the approval of the masses of party delegates or electors and the voters at large.
Thus, in reality, the people that Mr. Agyapong ought to pity are those party stalwarts and movers and shakers who spent the last 8 years cynically and systematically factionalizing the party and deviously creating what became known as the Agenda-2020 Schemers/Syndicate.
Now, most of them literally have their tails tucked in-between their legs and are pretending as if they never fiercely and nihilistically collaborated with the party’s main political opponents and the ardent detractors of their internal nemesis to ensure that the democratic reign of the former Justice and Foreign Minister under President John Agyekum-Kufuor never came to pass.
Indeed, a couple of such knaves have even called yours truly to vehemently deny having studiously worked against the presidential ambitions of Nana Akufo-Addo. Those are the ones to be pitied. What the likes of Mr. Agyapong ought to be doing, instead, is to either be praying or keeping vigilant eyes on the President in order to ensure that Nana Akufo-Addo makes all the most progressive and foresighted decisions to expeditiously move the destiny of Ghana and Ghanaians to much higher ground.
It has been said time and again that “Success has a legion fathers” and, I suppose, mothers, too; and this is precisely what is happening right now. But, of course, as I have often said, Nana Akufo-Addo and his closest associates and cabinet appointees have absolutely no time to fret over who either scandalously betrayed the ideals and cause of the party, or are presently pretending as if nothing of this sort ever occurred.
Rather, the key operatives of the Akufo-Addo Administration must be focused on ensuring that the party stays on the right side of the overwhelming majority of the Ghanaian electorate. Which means that preparing today’s youths to become the prosperous, progressive and responsible leaders of tomorrow must be the topmost priority of this government.
And Mr. Agyapong is absolutely dead-on-target when he notes that the government is studiously working to ensure that “all the loopholes in the system, especially the ones at the ports,” are promptly plugged to ensure that all the available resources in the country are fully mobilized and geared towards the material improvement of the lives of the citizenry at large.
It is not going to be easy, not by any stretch of the proverbial imagination; but the key operatives of the Akufo-Addo/Bawumia Administration have absolutely no choice, if they desire to have their memory etched into the pantheon of our national heroes and sheroes, as those who proudly and altruistically rose to the occasion when Ghana needed them the most.