Akua Bonsu
Certain things don’t make sense to me. May be in my old age, I am getting too old fashion in my thinking. For example, I know it is the aspiration of almost every Parliamentarian to earn a ministerial appointment. This suggests that a ministerial appointment is viewed, accurately or not, my Members of Parliament as being of a higher status that their current one. So why would members of the NDC who have attained that higher status be scrambling and spending huge sums of money to attain Parliamentary membership, a status lower than their current ones?
It makes even less sense when one considers the fact that President Mills does not have the balls to fire his ministers unless they pose a threat to him as in the case of Former Attorney General Martin Amidu. That means is someone currently occupies the position of minister or deputy minister, his or her position is safe unless they begin to pose s threat to the old man.
But don’t explain this logic to Victor Smith (Eastern Regional Minister), Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa (Deputy Minister of Information), Fiifi Kwetey (deputy Minister of Finance), Baba Jamal (Deputy Minister of Information), etc. These people, after stealing ridiculous amounts of money, and not having perhaps the sophistication to live in other societies, are all running for Parliamentary cover.
If they had confidence in the Mills administration’s performance and its consequential translation into a viable re-election prospect, one would imagine that these characters would channel their energies towards President Mills’ presidential re-election campaign. Instead they are fighting for their own survival.
And what a fight they are putting up. As Victor Smith goes about spraying money on NPP supporters in Abuakwa North, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa is busy bribing the chiefs at North Tongu to certify him as a son of the area. Fiifi Kwetey has all but abandoned his uphill propaganda quest of convincing a highly suspicious Ghanaian electorate about a high-performing Mills with his hollow Setting-the-record-straight campaign. He is now squarely focused on winning a seat in Parliament. One thing is for sure. These gentlemen are certain that the only way to remain employed by the government of Ghana is to jump from the executive to the legislature. They are not even entrepreneurial enough to start a business with their loot.
May be they secretly believe what Vice Presidential Candidate of the New Patriotic Party, Dr. Mamudu Bawumia said in his highly acclaimed lectures, content of which the IMF has confirmed. “You cannot run a government on propaganda.” I can hear Okudzeto Ablakwa saying “So you are right. But that does not mean we cannot carry out our propaganda in Parliament as you experienced folks in the NPP run the government.” And for the first time I say to you Mr.Ablakwa – Well said my friend.