Nana Darkwah, now a renowned and vindicated Seer, is still a victim of the ongoing hasty-flipping and near-partisan police action in Ghana. Why is he a seer, many a reader may want to know? He was correctly able to adduce reasons in support of his accusation against the Former President J.J. Rawlings on the issue of the conflagration that gutted the latter's residence. As many were scratching their heads trying fruitlessly to assign reasons for the cause of the inferno, our noble seer, a guy well ahead of his compatriots, boldly went on air to reveal to his listeners what he personally believed to be the cause of that destructive fire. He further disclosed what he thought to be the motive behind such a despicable act. While others were cowardly commiserating with the Rawlingses with doubts on their minds about the possible cause of the fire, the seer had already said it all.
Why is he vindicated seeing that he is still on trial for what many NDC sycophants conclude as his thoughtless remarks? Although he is still on trial simply for what in the eyes of many a Ghanaian is a selective justice under the President Mills' administration, his foretold reason for the fire has been confirmed by the subsequent actions of the Rawlingses coupled with the ignoble purposes of their Spokesperson. Their submitted defence in favour of their audacious quest to be re-housed by the government as aired is fraught with inconsistencies and lies. Did the seer not opine that the house was burnt by Rawlings in anticipation of acquiring a much better house gratis? In the aftermath of his arrest, short remand, incessant arraignments with the concurrent deferments which are more nuisance than pleasure, one sees the truth unfolding. The Rawlingses are alleged to have declined all alternative offers of re-housing by the President Atta Mills' NDC government. They are said to have insisted on being re-housed in a newly built house on the very ground where once stood their incinerated house. This house is to be built by their own chosen building contractor(s) to their own design and specifications. Can it then be conclusively deduced from the later developments that the house was burnt on premeditation? I leave this to your serene judgment as individuals.
The last time I checked, Nana Darkwah's case had once again been adjourned until an unspecified date in this month. The reason for the postponement was that the Circuit Court Judge, Justice Charles A. Wilson (I hope he is not related to that notorious car snatcher Carl Wilson), who is presiding over the case was on a month's training holiday to becoming a High Court Judge. I wish him good luck for his promotion which in fact has extricated him from the intricacies of the law of spreading fear and causing harm to the public and how it applies in Nana Darkwah's case. This particular case brought before him was actually doing his head in all for its obvious political undertone.
Former President Rawlings publicly castigates President Mills and his Government Ministers using all sorts of disparaging adjectives, words and comparisons to describe them. His wife, Nana Agyemang Konadu Rawlings, also lambasts the sitting President employing equally degrading words. Rawlings and his cronies among who is "Dr" Spio Garbrah, accuse the members of the current NDC government and the previous NPP government of any silly defamatory thing that momentarily passes through their mind's circuitry path. Have they been arrested or threatened with arrest? No! Does the "Indemnity and no Accountability Clause" as entrenched in the nation's Constitution grant any Tom, Dick and Harry from the seemingly offshoot recalcitrant NDC of which Rawlings is a tin god to commit crime with impunity?
NDC foot-soldiers are not an exemption from the intransigent perpetration of lawlessness in Ghana. Many a time have they chased out civil servants from their offices alleging that they are NPP appointees. Many people have lost their jobs upon being NPP guys who now deserve to be jobless because it is now the turn of the NDC to be in such positions. Did some not lose their lives to the craziness of the NDC thugs especially, when they were seizing toilets as if possessed? How many of these guys were arrested for their monstrous atrocities committed in the name of "yen aban na aba" - our government is in power? A member of the NPP sadly likens President Mills to a Chimp. He was straightaway bundled off to the police station and charged with their nonsensical "causing harm and spreading fear in public" Are the Ghana police gone mad due to their newfound politicised vivacity under the Mills' "slow but sure" administration? One would expect the police to be fair. They should cease being lopsidedly in favour and supportive of the cause of the NDC and their hooliganism. They are admonished not to be overly frenetic with the application of the Criminal Justice codes 207 & 208 - "causing harm and spreading fear in the public" This charge is bound to lose its flavour if the police continue to apply it senselessly in cases quite unrelated.
A case scenario where the police could have applied the mentioned criminal codes without anyone raising an eyebrow was when an alarmist somehow announced that Ghana was within minutes from encountering seismic activity. With the fate of Haiti fresh in the minds of many, the fear provoked in the country was disastrously enormous. The originator of that alarm could justifiably have been charged with spreading fear and causing harm if caught, but not the case of Nana Darkwah. How can expressing your mind about an individual, probably a rogue so to speak, cause fear and harm among the public?
"Agya Atta", please end this ongoing selective justice in Ghana. You may think the police are helping you by their deplorable tendency to instilling fear in those Ghanaians who don't belong in the NDC. They are in effect laying fertile grounds for your defeat in the 2012 elections. The earlier the police rein in the NDC foot-soldiers who have become law unto themselves the better. One Kwaku Duah Shakespeare Ofori-Atta, NDC Secretary from Abuakwah South in the Eastern Region tried his machismo luck but was busted by the police due to the timely intervention of Nana Okyehene. Kwaku Duah though has bragged stupidly and acted foolishly like many other NDC foot-soldiers, he can still defend himself. He should cite precedents from other regions where similar offences of closing, locking or bolting up offices by his fellow NDC truants have not incurred the wrath of the police let alone getting arrested and imprisoned.
I put it to those Ghana policemen and women who are trigger happy to apply those criminal justice codes as quoted above haphazardly that they are the very ones causing harm and spreading fear in the country. They are scaring people away from exercising their freedom of speech. And not only that, they are biased towards the NPP guys.
Food for thought - Is the mounting of unnecessary road checks with the aim of extorting money from drivers not more harmful and causes fear than what Nana Darkwah opined about Rawlings? Oh Ghana police, be realistic for once.
Nana Darkwah the seer is free forever! He will soon become a hero when NPP wrenches power from the NDC come 2012 elections. He is Ghana's Octopus Paul.
Rockson Adofo