Feature: Does President Mahama Know What He Is Talking About? – Asks Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jnr., Ph.D.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jnr., Ph.D.

It is a human system all right, so none of us have to expect our judicial process to be totally devoid of any fraudulent dealings. Nevertheless, it would be tantamount to playing a very dangerous game with the lives of Ghanaians for President John Dramani Mahama to assert that the country’s judicial system is pretty intact, in spite of the apocalyptic judicial travesty unearthed by renowned investigative journalist Mr. Anas Aremeyaw Anas. All in all, some 34 judges and magistrates have been magnetically captured on audio- and videotape eagerly negotiating for kickbacks in order to skew their verdicts in favor of criminal suspects and other litigants, who would otherwise have been found either guilty or liable for the offences for which they had been duly charged and arraigned before these officially inducted and publicly sworn administrators of justice and / or the law.

You see, the administration of justice in our country, for the most part, is not dependent on the question of precisely what percentage of high court judges and magistrates were caught in the documentary mesh or investigative net of Mr. Anas and his collaborators of the Tiger-Eye PI network. The sampling is statistically significant enough to be scientifically or objectively appropriated in drawing credible conclusions about the unacceptably corrupt nature of the country’s judicial system. And so, yes, the judicial system, as it institutionally stands, presently, is the only legitimate instrument of justice that we have. However, contrary to what President Mahama would have the rest of the world believe, the country’s judicial system is anything but intact. And it is very disheartening that as Chief State Minister, Mr. Mahama would presume to make light of this most serious canker.

You see, we have always known that the country’s judicial system was among the most corrupt on both the continent and around the globe, except that unlike Mr. Anas and his associates of Tiger-Eye PI, we neither had the skills nor resources to produce forensically sustainable evidence to back up our suspicions. And this is also the reason why I vehemently disagree with those who would have Mr. Anas unmasked as he appears in court to serve as prime witness to his epic and yeomanly exposé of perennial judicial scam-artistry. I shall more expansively delve into this aspect of our subject in another column. For now, suffice it to observe that the personal security and safety of Mr. Anas is far more significant than the vanity of the judges whom he has admirably and heroically exposed for being the reprobate scam artists that they almost incontrovertibly appear to be.

We can also indulge the “Mahamian” luxury of affording the indicted judges the due legal process. But even more significantly, we also need to wonder why the likes of Justices Logoh and Dery have been desperately using legal technicalities to stall the condign administration of justice and fair play. The abrupt suspension of the activities of the five-person investigation team established by Chief Justice Georgina Theodora Wood and the Judicial Council, on grounds of lawsuits filed by the indicted judges seeking to impugn the legality and authority of the players involved to sanction or discipline them, ought to give pause and cause to powerful and influential Ghanaians like Mr. Mahama to ponder the question of whether, indeed, our judicial system is as functionally sound, or intact, as the President would have the rest of the world believe.

In principle, I agree with Mr. Mahama that some of the snagged or indicted judges may not be guilty. But the reality of the desperate attempts by some of these indicted judges to stall the judicial process, ought to clearly and unmistakably inform Mr. Mahama that we are not dealing with people interested in justice and the rule of law here, as ironic as this may seem. The President says our judicial system is intact; but Chief Justice Wood says that some judges have turned their courtrooms into business enterprises. Now, who is telling the truth here? Dear Reader, you be the judge. Your guess is as good as mine!

The opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views or have the endorsement of the Editorial Board of www.africanewsanalysis.com, www.africa-forum.net and www.wapsfeatures.wordpress.com

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Ghanaian Politics: Hello, Nyaho-Tamakloe! By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jnr., Ph.D.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

His consanguinary – or blood – connection to President Mahama ought to be very well known by now to necessitate any further expatiation here, except for the imperative need for me to emphatically point out that the Supreme Court battle over the 2012 Presidential Election is squarely about the struggle for democratic power short of a logically justified armed struggle; and Dr. Nyaho Nyaho-Tamakloe had better be mindful of the same (See “NPP Focusing Too Much On Election Petition – Nyaho-Tamakloe” TV 3 News/Ghanaweb.com 7/13/13).

And so to expect the bulk of the New Patriotic Party leadership to sit back and be clinically aloof while a handful of lawyers battle it out at the Supreme Court is rather insulting; and that is being extremely polite about it. But, of course, if one were related to President Mahama and comfortably located like Dr. Nyaho-Tamakloe, stealthily and steadily and shamelessly undermining the NPP petitioners would be the fetching and/or prime choice for an avocation.

You see, Dr. Nyaho-Tamakloe poignantly approximates that old pidgin-English maxim that runs as follows: “Country broke or no de broke, I dey inside.” Ghana’s former ambassador to Serbia and Croatia clearly has nothing to lose. To be certain, he actually has far more to gain with one of his kinsmen being at the helm of our national affairs, than having a bunch of people with whom he only tenuously and blearily share ideological suasion. Remember the age-old maxim of “Blood is thicker than water”? That is glaringly what is at stake here in the shameless imagination and personal political fortunes of the former chairman of the Ghana Football Association (GBA).

Of course, none among the topmost executive ranks of the New Patriotic Party is deceived by the pompous moral pretensions of Dr. Nyaho-Tamakloe. Not too long ago, for instance, Mr. Jake Obetsebi-Lamptey squarely put Dr. Nyaho-Tamakloe where he belongs vis-a-vis latter’s relationship with the NPP, when the National Chairman of the country’s largest opposition party – at least for now – bitterly complained about the increasing liability that Dr. Nyaho-Tamakloe was becoming to the party.

I have warned in these very pages that his claim to being a founding member of the New Patriotic Party ought not to give Dr. Nyaho-Tamakloe the license or right to feel that he has any inalienable right to facilitate the party’s disintegration, even as he passionately let on to TV 3’s Mr. Kenneth Osei-Ampofo. But that his sentiments unabashedly and fanatically reside with his kinsman, the man who unconscionably colluded with Dr. Kwadwo Afari-Gyan to criminally rig Election 2012 cannot be gainsaid.

Now, it is up to the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the New Patriotic Party to boldly and frankly conduct Dr. Nyaho-Tamakloe out of its fold and into the sunsplashed nirvana of political tolerance that he claims to be the hallmark of the Rawlings-minted National Democratic Congress. You see, you don’t want these forensically provable outsiders to be smugly telling the rest of us where the current pulse and center of party leadership ought to be located. That is simply not a salient characteristic of an authentic team player.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D. Department of English Nassau Community College of SUNY Garden City, New York

E-mail: okoampaahoofe@optimum.net

The opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views or have the endorsement of the Editorial Board of http://www.africanewsanalysis.com, http://www.africa-forum.net and http://www.wapsfeatures.wordpress.com

Ghanaian Politics: Zip It, Segbefia! – By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jnr., Ph.D.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

The decision by the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) to organize and host a forum geared towards finding lasting and constructive solutions to the electoral snags occasioned by the use of biometric voting machines, is a salutary intellectual exercise that could not have come at a more opportune moment (See “Alex Segbefia Cautions IEA Over ‘Contemptuous’ Forum To Review Electoral System” Modernghana.com 6/28/13).

It is not as if the key operatives of the IEA have been going around insisting on only one form of an acceptable verdict, as President John Dramani Mahama has been widely reported to be doing. And so it is not clear precisely what he means, when Mr. Alexander Segbefia cautions the think-tankers of the IEA about their risk of judicial contempt if they decide to go ahead with their forum, even while the unnecessarily snail-paced Atuguba-presided Supreme Court hearing of the Akufo-Addo/New Patriotic Party (NPP) Election 2012 presidential petition direly threatens to virtually halt any progressive discourse on how to run a legitimate constitutionally democratic political culture in the country.

You see, cynics like the former deputy chief of staff of the late President John Evans Atta-Mills are deathly afraid that most Ghanaians are enlightened enough to fully appreciate the fact that the Supreme Court exists fundamentally to interpret laws that are already on the books, or in operation, as it were, rather than legislate for Ghanaian citizens how to determine the details of the kind of constitutional democracy they deem to be the most progressive and efficient.

Maybe what political miscreants like Mr. Segbefia ought to be doing is advising Justice William Atuguba to stop playing Minister of the Interior or the Inspector General of Police by indiscriminately and erratically rounding up any citizens who appear to be aptly impatient with his indisputably amateurish handling of the Election 2012 petition hearings.

Significantly, Mr. Segbefia appears to be in wholehearted agreement with the IEA forum on the country’s new-found biometric electoral protocol. His only qualm is that such forum or workshop be delayed until the Atuguba Court has handed down its decision on the Election 2012 petition.

Well, maybe those politically comfortable Ghanaians with Mr. Segbefia’s mindset ought to be reminded of the fact that the well-being and destiny of the country are far more important than the unduly drawn out deliberations of the Atuguba Court. Come on, let the forum go on!!!

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D. Department of English Nassau Community College of SUNY Garden City, New York

E-mail: okoampaahoofe@optimum.net

The opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views of have the endorsement of the Editorial Board of http://www.africanewsanalysis.com, http://www.africa-forum.net and http://www.wapsfeatures.wordpress.com

Ghanaian Politics: President Mahama Is In Contempt Of The Supreme Court – Argues Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jnr., Ph.D.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

Now we know exactly what he means, when Ghana’s President John Dramani Mahama asserts that he will abide by any verdict delivered by the Atuguba-presided Supreme Court hearing the Election 2012 petition brought before it by last December’s presidential candidate of the main opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP).

As Mr. Samuel Okudzeto, the distinguished former president of the Ghana Bar Association (GBA) carpingly observed recently, it is disturbingly clear that Mr. Mahama is hell-bent on contemptuously prejudicing the Supreme Court’s petition hearings in his favor (See “Okudzeto Jabs Mahama Over Election Victory Comment” Radioxyzonline.com/ Ghanaweb.com 6/13/13).

Indeed, President Mahama cannot pretend not to appreciate the rather tired judicial terminology of “Sub-Judice,” or the imperative citizenship obligation not to publicly comment on any controversial case being deliberated upon by any legitimately constituted court of the land. And so we all know now that Mr. Mahama is both a compulsive and a congenital liar who ought not to be ruling our country. And this is precisely the sort of consternation so poignantly, albeit curiously diplomatically, expressed by Mr. Okudzeto, when the veteran statesman and former GBA president regretfully noted that the frenziedly embattled Mr. Mahama ought not to have moved so drastically away from his earlier “noble” public assurance that “he would abide by whatever verdict the [Supreme] Court reaches.”

We have decided to let the Ghanaian electorate and the citizenry at large decide on the “noble” dimension of the attitude taken by Mr. Mahama towards the ongoing Election 2012 presidential petition hearings. And, of course, on the latter score must be promptly recalled the fact that during festivities marking the 21st anniversary of the mischievously suave morphing of the erstwhile Provisional National Defense Council (PNDC) into the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Mr. Mahama was widely reported to have declared to party members, supporters and sympathizers as follows: “Our victory was won cleanly and fairly…. Justice will be served and cannot come to any other conclusion than acknowledging the very transparent, free and fair victory that we won at the elections [polls?].”

That the preceding quote is the kind of rhetorical belligerence that provoked such apocalyptic infernos as Rwanda, Congo, Liberia and Sierra Leone can hardly be gainsaid. As well, Mr. Mahama’s pronouncement seriously undermines the integrity of Ghana’s judicial system, and one fervidly hopes that the operatives of the International Criminal Court (ICC)are paying sedulous attention.

Needless to say, it is this kind of entrenched intolerance that makes the National Democratic Congress immitigably and inexcusably dangerous and inimical to the salutary development of Ghanaian democracy. There is, however, one positive corollary to this patently intemperate and bratty tantrum expressed by President Mahama; and it is the fact that his grossly contradictory and entrenched position, vis-a-vis the Election 2012 petition hearings, puts his political opponents under no bounden obligation, whatsoever, to accept an unfavorable decision by the Atuguba-presided Supreme Court.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D. Department of English Nassau Community College of SUNY Garden City, New York

E-mail: okoampaahoofe@optimum.net

The opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views or have the endorsement of the Editorial Board of http://www.africanewsanalysis.com, http://www.africa-forum.net and http://www.wapsfeatures.wordpress.com

Ghanaian Politics: Too Stupid For Addison, Maybe – By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jnr., Ph.D.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

I am actually beginning to like this pathetic cognitive basket-case called Johnson Asiedu-Nketia. In the latest of his characteristic comedic bouts, the general-secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) claims that he lasted only one day in the witness-box with Mr. Philip Addison, counsel for Nana Akufo-Addo and the NPP petitioners, because so superbly had the garrulous NDC chief-scribe performed that Mr. Addison had almost immediately hit a brick wall in his cross-examination of Mr. Asiedu-Nketia (See “I Was Too Hot For Addison To Handle In Court” JoyOnline.com/Ghanaweb.com 6/7/13).

Of course, the facile assumption here is that the longer a witness lasts in the witness-box, the less difficult it must have been for the cross-examining counsel of the opposing party. Nothing could be farther from the truth. For in reality, the diametrically opposite is often the case; for instance, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, the second petitioner and star-witness of the Election 2012 petitioners, spent about two weeks in the witness-box because the Oxbridge-educated and internationally renowned economist clearly appears to have been a rather too tough a nut for Mr. Tsatsu “The Thief” Tsikata to crack.

And to be certain, so frustrating had the former Deputy-Governor of the Bank of Ghana made matters for the NDC respondents that even Justice William Atuguba, a well-known ideological partisan of the National Democratic Congress, could not help but impatiently complain that Dr. Bawumia was making matters too hectic for the NDC legal wiz-kid by his deliberately convoluted answers to questions repeatedly posed him by the first convicted felon in postcolonial Ghanaian history to practice law before the country’s august Supreme Court.

In the case of Mr. Asiedu-Nketia, the petitioners’ attorney managed to readily stump him in a classical perjury fashion within a couple of hours of the NDC scribe’s mounting the witness-box. And this was done in the most fundamental manner, by simply replaying the digitized recorded voice of the obstreperously talkative Mr. Asiedu-Nketia to the witness, who almost immediately contradicted himself and effectively mangled his own credibility by sheepishly confessing to the same.

At any rate, two legally grievous incidents have occurred against the balance sheets of the respondents which Mr. Asiedu-Nketia and his supporters ought to be feverishly worrying themselves about. And this is, of course, the fact that both the NDC scribe and Dr. Kwadwo Afari-Gyan, Ghana’s Electoral Commissioner, perjured themselves on the witness stand. In other words, both the second and third respondents took a solemn oath to tell the truth, and nothing but the unvarnished truth, and then like the congenital and pathological liars that they well appear to be, went right ahead and did exactly what they had sworn not to do!

In any democratically functional and robust and civilized political culture, both Messrs. Afari-Gyan and Asiedu-Nketia would be facing stiff and long prison jail terms. In Ghana, where high court judges have been summarily abducted and savagely assassinated, Mafia-style, under the cover of darkness on purely ethnic and ideological grounds by a government pontifically claiming to be about the laudable business of “probity and accountability,” the judicial sanction for perjury quizzically appears to be one of simply having brazen perjurers like Mr. Asiedu-Nketia thumb their noses at the Supreme Court.

Is this the Ghana in which I was born and raised? What a country “in which we live in it,” Uncle Atukwei!

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D. Department of English Nassau Community College of SUNY Garden City, New York

E-mail: okoampaahoofe@optimum.net

The opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views or have the endorsement of the Editorial Board of http://www.africanewsanalysis.com, http://www.africa-forum.net and http://www.wapsfeatures.wordpress.com

Ghanaian Politics: Asiedu-Nketia Wins One For NPP! – By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, jnr., Ph.D.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

Finally, the truth must have begun to sink in, with both Messrs. Johnson Asiedu-Nketia and John Dramani Mahama desperately attempting to wriggle themselves out of traps which they mischievously set for their ideological nemeses and political opponents (See “I Stand By The Citi-Fm Interview – Asiedu-Nketia” Ghana News Agency (GNA)/ Ghanaweb.com 5/30/13).

I intend to deal with Mr. Mahama’s vehement denial that, indeed, he deliberately colluded with Dr. Kwadwo Afari-Gyan to rig Election 2012 in a separate article.

Anyway, in the aforesaid interview granted Citi-Fm Radio by the general-secretary of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC), and poignantly captured in the caption of this article, Mr. Asiedu-Nketia categorically called for the summary annulment of the results of any polling stations whose presiding officers were confirmed to have permitted voters to cast their ballots without biometric verification.

Interestingly, when he pompously and pontifically mounted the witness-box barely a week ago, the gaunt personality affectionately nicknamed “General Mosquito” vehemently insisted to the Atuguba-presided court hearing the Akufo-Addo/New Patriotic Party (NPP) Election 2012 presidential petition that, in fact, absolutely no voting had been allowed at any polling station in the country without biometric verification.

In laity terms, the preceding is called a factual contradiction. In other words, it is logically incongruous for the NDC general-secretary to, on the one hand, call for the summary annulment of the polling results of any polling station where voting was allowed to proceed without biometric verification by polling officials and then, on the other hand, assert imperiously from the witness-box in the Atuguba-presided court to Mr. Philip Addison, counsel for the petitioners, that he, Mr. Asiedu-Nketia, has absolutely no knowledge about the penalty exacted for biometrically unverified voting. In legal and judicial parlance, such deliberate and willful testimonial contradiction is called PERJURY.

Looked at another way, Mr. Asiedu-Nketia swore an oath to tell the Atuguba Court nothing but the unvarnished truth, “so help me God,” and then criminally violated his oath by lying before officers of the highest court of the land. In most civilized democratic national cultures, PERJURY is a felony punishable by a prison sentence or jail term. It is not clear whether, in fact, the NDC general-secretary fully appreciates the significance of the crime which he just committed before the highest court of the land.

At any rate, whether he willfully or inadvertently perjured himself is beside the point. For, as the age-old maxim goes: “Ignorance of the law is no excuse”; more so when one is a prominent political figure like Mr. Johnson Asiedu-Nketia, and also President John Dramani Mahama, of course!

I am indescribably elated that finally, the petitioners are fast homing in by using the humongous corpus of unguarded media testimony of the respondents against the latter, as I had on occasion admonished several times in the recent past. What Mr. Addison so deftly succeeded in doing with the incontrovertible media testimony of Mr. Asiedu-Nketia’s is called a JUDICIAL-JUJITSU, that is, letting the unconscionable prevaricator literally stew in his own brine.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D. Department of English Nassau Community College of SUNY Garden City, New York

E-mail: okoampaahoofe@optimum.net

The opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views or have the endorsement of the Editorial Board of http://www.africanewsanalysis.com, http://www.africa-forum.net and http://www.wapsfeatures.wordpress.com

Ghanaian Politics: Ben Ephson Is Just A Shameless Mischief-Maker – argues Kwame-Okoampa Ahoofe, Jnr., Ph.D.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

He pontifically calls himself a pollster par-excellence; but even as former President Jerry John Rawlings had occasion to bitterly complain recently, there is a piddling little about Mr. Ben Ephson’s so-called periodic polling that is credible or could be said to be worthy of our attention and moral consideration.

In the latest of such mischief, the NDC-sponsored media hack claims, rather funnily, that most of the members and supporters of the main opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) have lost faith and confidence in the merit of the Election 2012 petition hearing before the Atuguba-presided Supreme Court (See “NPP Supporters Losing Faith In Election Petition – Ben Ephson” Radioxyzonline.com/Ghanaweb.com 5/31/13).

The first problem here is that Mr. Ephson does not tell his audience precisely how his polling was conducted, and the profiles of the subjects of his polling. For instance, how many respondents were polled, spread over how many regions of the country? What were the professional, cultural and ethnic backgrounds, as well as the gender description and/or orientation of those polled? And what kinds of questions were these respondents posed?

Of course, we also know that Mr. Ephson has absolutely no credible professional training in polling; and so all that one can logically conclude here is that maybe he just got a stipend and/or salary increase from his paymasters and decided to go to bat for them, by peddling such patent hot air. Needless to say, any discerning individual who has been studiously watching the Ghanaian political scene ought to be fully aware, by now, of the rank disaffection of an overwhelming majority of Ghanaian citizens for the Mahama government and, indeed, the decidedly outmoded pseudo-socialist policies of the so-called National Democratic Congress (NDC).

But even far more significant ought to be pointed out the fact that the Election 2012 petition is definitely not about whether anybody thinks or believes that the Akufo-Addo Revolution has merit. The latter has already been eloquently affirmed by the decision of the Supreme Court to hear the petition and make a critically considered pronouncement on the same. And so, really, other than seeking to make an abject nuisance of himself, it is not clear what Mr. Ephson is talking about.

And when he names Mr. Kwame Pianim, Dr. Nyaho-Tamakloe and that insufferably obnoxious odd-ball and butterball who virtually ran the Volta River Authority aground, as well as criminally pocketing at least half of the funding for the Ghana@50 independence anniversary celebration, as “hardcore supporters” of the NPP, one immediately begins to wonder whether it is not about time that Mr. Ephson checked himself into a mental asylum or seek psychiatric reevaluation and rehabilitation.

What I am increasingly beginning to admire about the man, though, is the fact that Mr. Ephson appears to be an indefatigable propagandist who takes himself and his politically-inflected opinions far more seriously than he obviously ought to.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D. Department of English Nassau Community College of SUNY Garden City, New York

E-mail: okoampaahoofe@optimum.net

The opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views or have the endorsement of the Editorial Board of http://www.africanewsanalysis.com, http://www.africa-forum.net and http://www.wapsfeatures.wordpress.com

Ghanaian Politics: “A Renewed Sense of Potential”? Maybe! By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jnr., Ph.D.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

I read Ghana’s President John Dramani Mahama’s speech of the quoted title, presented at the 50th Anniversary Celebration of the African Union (AU) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and felt a dolorous sense of wistfulness (See the Opinions section of MyJoyOnline.com 5/26/13). I felt a palpable sense of wistfulness because the leader of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) expediently sought to shortchange the facts of history by rather mischievously describing Ghana’s first Prime Minister and President, Mr. Kwame Nkrumah, as the “founder” of the erstwhile Gold Coast. The grim reality is that Mr. Mahama claims to be a remarkable historian in his own right.

His gaping failure, or even deliberate omission, to mention at least a couple of the Founding Fathers, and Mothers, of Ghana readily informed me that as a nation, we have a pretty long way to go, let alone to speak of a continent fervidly in search and in need of organic unification. The fact of the matter is that inasmuch as he is incontrovertibly regarded as a standout, or even foremost, among the ranks of the legendary and immortalized BIG SIX, Kwame Nkrumah is not the “founder” of Ghana in much the same way that Gen. George Washington is not the founder of the United States of America.

And until our leaders soberly come to terms with this objective and plain fact, the vigorous push towards African unification is unavoidably bound to be arduous and rancorous. I make the foregoing observation because recently, a young and apparently cynical reader of my columns wrote to demand why none of the African leaders celebrating the golden jubilee of the African Union, in Addis Ababa, had been heard to mention the name of Dr. J. B. Danquah, Ghana’s foremost constitutional lawyer and thinker of his generation and a fierce fighter for democratic governance.

Well, I don’t know that many staunch supporters of African Unification recognize the inescapable fact that without the democratic rule of law and order, the noble dream of a United Africa will continue to be a pipe dream. This is where the lofty democratic ideals of Drs. Danquah and Busia and Mr. Dombo come to the fore. In other words, it is absolutely nothing short of the unpardonably insulting for Ghana’s President Mahama to cavalierly presume to take for granted the high moral stance taken and hard fought by the putative Doyen of Gold Coast and Ghanaian politics to ensure that Ghana became the virtually unique and/or exemplary bastion of democratic culture and governance that leaders like Mr. Mahama proudly brag about today.

In the main, and predictably, Mr. Mahama’s Addis Ababa speech was fraught with platitudes. But it was his allusive and brief concluding paragraphs that piqued my attention and interest the most. In concluding his speech, this is what the electorally embattled Ghanaian president had to recall: “At that first African summit [in 1963] in Addis Ababa, Emperor Haile Selassie said[,] ‘May this convention of union last 1,000 years.’ With the renewed sense of potential on the African continent, indeed, it shall.”

It is not clear exactly how Mr. Mahama appreciates this memorable quote from Emperor Haile Selassie; but it clearly could be interpreted in two distinctive ways: Either the Ethiopian monarch meant to say that the annual talk-shopping festivities of the erstwhile Organization of African Unity were apt to last a thousand years, or that an organically and politically united African federation was being wished a millennial span of existence.

Linguistically speaking, the first interpretation, as logically superficial as it may seem, was clearly what Emperor Selassie meant. Indeed, had he meant the second interpretation, the Ethiopian potentate would have worded his speech the following way: “May this [present] covention [or gathering] lead us to 1,000 years of continental African unity.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D. Department of English Nassau Community College of SUNY Garden City, New York

E-mail:okoampaahoofe@optimum.net

The opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views or have the endorsement of the Editorial Board of http://www.africanewsanalysis.com, http://www.africa-forum.net and http://www.wapsfeatures.wordpress.com

Ghanaian Politics: Asantehene Addresses The Wrong Audience – Observes Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jnr., Ph.D.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

In the nation’s capital with a delegation of chiefs for a lecture on democratic political culture and governance, the Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei-Tutu II, was reported to have paid a courtesy call on the 2012 presidential candidate of the main opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) and admonished Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo and his supporters to abide by any decision handed down by the Atuguba-presided panel of Supreme Court jurists hearing the NPP petition, vehemently challenging the legitimacy and integrity of both President John Dramani Mahama and the 2012 general election as a whole (See “Otumfuo Counsels Nana Addo to Accept Petition Outcome” JoyOnline.com/Ghanaweb.com 5/17/13).

Needless to say, the Asantehene was preaching to the wrong crowd and audience. First of all, the institutional sponsor of the democracy lecture being attended by Otumfuo Osei-Tutu II, the National Commission on Civic Education (NCCE), was founded by Dr. Kofi Abrefa Busia, one of the three pillars behind the ideological tenets and agenda of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), and not by either Chairman Jerry John Rawlings, the founding father of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC), or Mr. Kwame Nkrumah, the first postcolonial Ghanaian premier and founder of the so-called Convention People’s Party (CPP).

But even more importantly, the Asantehene ought to have conferred with the judges hearing the Election 2012 petition and admonished them about the fact that their conduct and decision were being sedulously watched by the global community; and also that the youths of today and posterity would not judge them kindly if their judicial performance is found to lack the highest level of integrity and professionalism. And maybe the operatives of the International Criminal Court (ICC) ought to dispatch a delegation to monitor the judicial proceedings, if they are not already doing so.

In other words, prevailing on Nana Akufo-Addo and the main opposition New Patriotic Party to preempt their righteous craving for justice, by vacuously undertaking to abide by any decision handed down by the Supreme Court of Ghana is grossly ill-advised. It is grossly ill-advised because the Asantehene has yet to significantly and publicly comment on the incontrovertible evidence of deliberate rigging of Election 2012 by Messrs. Mahama and Afari-Gyan. He needs to comment on this because he is the most powerful traditional ruler in the country and, therefore, cannot pretend to be totally unaware of the kind of political corruption and government-sponsored acts of mayhem and downright brutality that are the daily fare of the existence of the proverbial average Ghanaian.

Secondly, the sanguinary history of the National Democratic Congress and before the latter, the so-called Provisional National Defense Council (P/NDC) must not be either condoned or appeased, and the members and supporters of the P/NDC ought to be made to fully appreciate the fact that theirs is an unpardonably bloody political heritage.

Indeed, Nana Akufo-Addo demonstrates his enviable patriotism when he pledges to put the peace and political stability of Ghana above all else. Nevertheless, the NPP leader ought to be also reminded of the fact that the imperative need for democratic justice and accountability cannot be facilely sacrificed on the altar of bankrupt peaceability and/or tranquillity. The latter quality-of-life existential feature is what differentiates a civilized polity or society from a half-enslaved nation.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D. Department of English Nassau Community College of SUNY Garden City, New York

E-mail: okoampaahoofe@optimum.net

The opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views or have the endorsement of the Editorial Board of http://www.africanewsanalysis.com, http://www.africa-forum.net and http://www.wapsfeatures.wordpress.com

Ghanaian Politics: Justice, Not Political Advantage, Young Man – Urges Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jnr., Ph.D.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

The Akan have a saying that “It is only the fool who permits his gonads to be stepped upon twice by his opponents/enemies.” I have thoroughly crushed the gonads of this SOB before; back then, he promised to file a lawsuit against yours truly for calling him the arrant and congenital fool that he inescapably and veritably is. Now, the SOB has come up with another chunk of rancid meat captioned “Televising Supreme Court Will Offer No Political Advantage” (Ghanaweb.com 4/17/13).

Anyway, it may be recalled that when I set his rotten butts on fire the last time, the SOB apologetically claimed to be “a critical neutralist” in the service of the salutary enhancement of Ghanaian democracy. But it is all too clear that the poor soul has absolutely no appreciation, whatsoever, for a transparent democratic culture; and this is the reason why he sees no advantage in having the Akufo-Addo/New Patriotic Party petition challenging the political legitimacy of President John Dramani Mahama multicast.

You see, he has spent most of the last three months vigorously campaigning for the NPP petition to be summarily deep-sixed without any hearing because in his warped imagination, the international community has already approved of the declaration of Mr. Mahama as the winner of Election 2012 by the clinically roguish Dr. Kwadwo Afari-Gyan who, by the way, announced a total voting figure that was way above the number of registered voters in the country. And inextricably caught with his pants down, as it were, Dr. Afari-Gyan fatuously insists that it was a genuine slip of the tongue, and that he ought to be allowed to get away with such seditious and capital crime. Fat chance! New Yorkers are wont to say.

The fact of the matter is that even a clinical idiot appreciates the fact that judicial transparency can only enhance the quality of deliberative arguments and the ultimate verdict that will eventually be returned. Thus having the Akufo-Addo petition multicast also implies, and rightly so, that the same much-touted international community that supposedly endorsed the legitimacy of Election 2012, would also have the legal right to examine whatever sustainable forensic evidence that the losing party has to back up its vehement protestation of a flagrantly rigged Election 2012.

And the foregoing, needless to say, is precisely what has mischief-makers like the author of the article under examination literally peeing and defecating in their pants. Unfortunately, the die has already been cast; and so far, true to form, the Akufo-Addo/NPP faction has set the global community into seriously re-thinking the credibility of Ghana’s Election 2012, and even others before the latter.

Indeed, it is my unabashed contention that had Nana Akufo-Addo won his party’s presidential nomination for Elections ’92 and ’96, the history of how elections are conducted in Ghana would be totally different today. Needless to say, Strongman Jerry John Rawlings would still have gotten away with capital crime, just as he did in the case of the abduction and brutal assassination of the three Akan high court judges – now, don’t you write to me bitching about the “tribal” undertones of my articles; the assassination of the judges was incontrovertibly an Anlo-Ewe orchestrated act of intimidation and ethnic cleansing. And this is why telecasting the Akufo-Addo petition globally adds a significant boost to the personal security of the sitting judges – Justices Sarkodie, Koranteng-Addow and Agyepong were not this lucky.

Then also, we now have an International Criminal Court (ICC) poised to taking “good care” of any certified butchers left among the knavish ranks of the so-called National Democratic Congress who may be spoiling for an open season on the Atuguba panel of Supreme Court judges.

The foregoing, of course, is what writers of articles like that which is captioned “Televising Supreme Court Will Offer No Political Advantage” fervidly wish Ghanaians to have forgotten so soon. So far, the Akufo-Addo side has forensically demonstrated beyond the proverbial shadow of any doubt that Election 2012 was anything but transparent and fair, minor glitches in evidentiary presentation notwithstanding. And on the latter score, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, the former Deputy-Governor of the Bank of Ghana and the NPP Vice-Presidential Candidate for Elections 2008 and 2012 deserves our unstinted admiration.

Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D. Department of English Nassau Community College of SUNY Garden City, New York

E-mail: okoampaahoofe@optimum.net

The opinions expressed are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect the views or have the endorsement of the Editorial Board of http://www.africanewsanalysis.com, http://www.africa-forum.net and http://www.wapsfeatures.wordpress.com