Staying In The Frying Pan…
The majority of Ghanaian voters, wisely or unwisely (only time will tell), have decided to stay in the frying pan of the NDC, albeit with a new, and hopefully, a better chef in charge; rather than attempt to jump from it and end up in the fiery inferno an obviously unreformed and unrepentant NPP might turn out to be. Yes, one must allow for the possibility that, regardless of allegations of drugs use or leaving Oxford under still cloudy conditions and all that “all-die-be-die”, “ye Akanfo” bravado nonsense in furtherance of the Akan Agenda launched by JB Danquah decades ago, and ably exploited by Busia and the PP in 1969 - posited on a presumed “Akan” “majoritifo” (always an “Asante” or an Akyem) that must “rule by law” and “democratically” the “minoritifo,” often defined as “Ewe” - (I don’t know where they get their census data from), Nana could have been something else in office, in an attempt to leave a clean and laudable legacy, after having had it all and done that! But that's all water going under the bridge now, as I don’t believe that the ongoing challenge the NPP is mounting against the election results will lead to the overturning of the announced verdict. If they could not clearly defeat a fragmented and very fractious NDC at the polls and expect the Supreme Court, which former President Kufuor had stuffed with pro-NPP judges sympathetic to his agenda to nail Tsatsu Tsikata, to hand over the Presidency to them with one of their dubious decisions, they better think twice. Ghanaians have been suffering enough gargantuan financial losses thanks to our heavily compromised and unlearned judges who think they are agents of vested interests, not the protectors of the rights of the tax payers or electorate who pay their salaries!
For one, I am much baffled by their (NPP) claims, just as I am confused with the handling of the Waterville Mafioso orchestrated Woyome case as something Woyome single-handedly engineered and executed for his personal benefit by even the dim-wit opponents of the NDC. This, in spite of Woyome himself issuing a statement specifying how the booty was shared, with Waterville even taking him to court for taking too much for his “expenses”!
Anyway, digression aside, all the political parties got the same Blue or Red Print or whatever results prints from the polling and collation centres and by now, one would have expected at least someone to corroborate the allegations made by the NPP. Or, there is a deadly conspiracy of silence by the other parties in collusion with the NDC and the EC to cheat the NPP of its prematurely declared victory by my former Mensah Sarbah “Okponglo” roommate, Sir John? I think it’d be a waste of time indulging in speculative analysis as to what might have happened, in the absence of any hard facts from the NPP. But since writing the foregoing, the CPP Chairwoman Samia Nkrumah had issued a statement in which she was silent on the allegations of cheating. I excoriated her for the singular irrelevancy of the CPP in even addressing the most pressing and critical issue facing us at the moment. The PPP too had issued a statement which I wrote off as a load of bollocks, for its bloody-minded vacuity. I think I have to find time to deal with the pathetic leaders of the Nkrumahist tradition derived parties who have managed to worked themselves into delusional nincompoops and comic reliefs in the electoral process in Ghana.
No doubt, with the NDC retained in power with a different President whose dynamism as Vice to the late Mills made him appear more presidential than the late President, we should expect a more pro-active rule. But many Ghanaians, especially the about 5-10% floating voters, I believe, gauging from conversations with many people, did not vote for him in order to allow business to proceed as usual. They chose what they consider the lesser of two devils, with an internal exorcist in the person of Rawlings, in spite of having worked himself into an embarrassing, old albatross that thinks he is a dragon, always breathing fire and brimstone in the bid to get rid of the devil within. So, they think there is some hope for us in the hands of the NDC under affable President Mahama, who should not be punished for the obvious failings of the late President Mills.
And if his actions in response to reported cases of abuse of office since being sworn in as President were not just knee-jerk reactions and gimmicks in the heat of the elections, then we hope to see a more serious handling of the endemic corruption and lawlessness in and under the outgoing regime. Even though he was an integral part of the outgoing regime, we are aware that he was at the receiving end of the barbs of the “babies with sharp teeth,” and the “evil dwarfs” were closing in on him too, and so should know what was unwholesome in the previous regime. At least, one garrulous kingpin, Koku Anyidoho, has since publicly confessed a new found humility since JM assumed the Presidency.
Of course, having shown us that he also knew how to bring the pork home to his own people through the almost total amassing of those scholarships to study abroad for candidates from northern Ghana, some of them clearly unjustified - whatever is the porous justification - his hands are not so clean. For, some of us are not going to rest on our oars in combating the lawlessness and the corruption that has become characteristic of our body politic. President Mahama should therefore not expect a rosy time in office if he expects business to continue as usual once he is sworn in. And sworn in, he’d be, whatever the NPP does. I hope they (NPPians) have not become delusional like my ex-Nkrumahist comrades.
Just like many people who will be presenting their Christmas lists and New Year wishes to President Mahama, I would like to present him with my own list. I don’t have any hamper for him. It was a tough year so I have instituted an austerity.
Paramount to me is the need to curb drastically the endemic corruption and lawlessness in the country. I had already sent out an open letter to him on a more personal issue which is awaiting attention. I certainly therefore do not expect him to allow the continuation of the use of the Police by one side in a dispute, whether it is a chieftaincy or debt fracas, to harass and abuse the freedom and rights of the other party. And I certainly do not expect the Police, the Customs and Excise personnel and public officials, to continue the graft they presently indulge in with reckless abandon without taking any punitive action against the recalcitrant elements on the public’s payroll.
Second on my list is bringing out the social in the claimed social democracy of the NDC. This is what shall create the industries and the jobs which are critically needed in the country. With the Rawlings factor, which is undoubtedly populist and right-wing, drown, we expect to see unfolding the left of centre which represents the Nkrumahist tradition the NDC has clearly captured. I personally do not expect much in that direction but the NDC must wake up to the fact that even the NPP in office was more to the left in its socio-economic policies than them, even though the political rhetoric of the NPP is right-wing, market oriented, private enterprise and property grabbing in practice, by the way!
Thirdly, curb the deadly carnage on our roads. Rein in the police who allow decrepit vehicles to ply our roads and ignore bad driving for what bribes they collect from drivers. This is legalised manslaughter on our roads must be stopped!
Fourthly, for heaven’s sake! Ghana is a secular state, not a Christian nation! Keep it as such and leave that God, God, God nonsense which you yourself is a cheerleader, following on the heels of the TB Joshua mesmerised late President Mills, out of the Castle! Some of us who have mentally evolved cosmologically into the scientific, rational world order, leaving behind us the Weberian, primitive substantive rationalisations of our ancestors, find it most annoying and depressing the way God is invoked by pundits of both the NDC and NPP and their fake pastor hirelings in their dubious pursuit of political power. If there is indeed hell, we all know that all of them will burn at its fieriest corner one day, anyway.
Lastly but not the least, review the horrendously unfavourable laws, regulations and intended bill governing the nascent oil sector as a matter of urgency. Ghana is no longer a beggar in the oil sector and we do not need any enticing packages to bring the investors in. They are the ones begging and bribing to come in. Review the laws and the bill or be damned forever! It is your legacy and it is yours to do what you wish it to be afterall!
I wish all Ghanaians a Happy New Year! May your frying pan turn into a rose garden!
Andy C.Y. Kwawukume
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