Sunday,
December 2, 2012
As we inch toward Election Day
this Friday, some extra-ordinary events have begun happening to provide some
comic relief. Forget about the Hassan Ayariga antics and turn to this latest
one, reported by Sammi Wiafe, Citi News reporter in Kumasi:
“… Akufo-Addo took a tumble when
the stage on which he was addressing a crowd caved in at the Jubilee Park in
Kumasi, on Sunday. He and Kufuor escaped unhurt. Akufo-Addo was addressing
party supporters at the rally when the incident occurred but no casualties were
recorded.”
Wiafe reported that the rally
came to an abrupt end after the incident, saying “All of the executives who
were sitting on this particular stage, all of them fell.”
Painfully funny, you might call it?
Or sabotage by the carpenters who built the platform? Hirelings of the NDC? Who
knows?
No matter what, the incident provides
some food-for-thought for us, tempted to be superstitious at such times.
Now that the political platform
on which he stands to make such pronouncements has begun caving in under
him—virtually throwing him off balance and abruptly ending his venom-filled pontifications,
I hope he will look far beyond the surface to do some serious introspection to tread
cautiously.
Let me indulge in some dangerous
superstition here. Nothing happens just for its own sake. The Jubilee Park incident
is a harbinger of many political misfortunes awaiting Akufo-Addo.
Now that his “All-die-be-die”
mantra is manifesting in an “All-fall-be-fall” episode, he had better take
caution.
Some of us have already made it
clear that no matter what Akufo-Addo means to his fanatics wearing thick
blinders and failing to see what we have seen to reject him, he is not
well-cut-out to lead Ghana. We have adduced several reasons to support our disinclination
toward him and concluded that his fixation on nothing but extravagant promises
portrays him as a dangerous monomaniac who will create problems, not solve existing
ones.
We have rejected him because he
is not worth our bother. He has very
serious problems that aren’t difficult to fathom. He is double-faced and can’t
be trusted.
While stridently shouting on
political platforms to support his claim of being against the spilling of blood
in the pursuit of his mordant Presidential ambitions, he isn’t taking any
concrete action to persuade Ghanaians to see him as such.
He has stoutly defended his “All-die-be-die”
war-cry and turned a blind eye to all the trouble that his followers are
causing all over the place, especially in the Ashanti Region, where he recently
joined the other Presidential Candidates to sign the Kumasi Peace Pact.
The manner in which he is
conducting affairs clearly indicates that he is the Ghanaian version of the Roman
god Janus, showing his double-face posture wherever he goes.
I have been wondering why he is
so. The answer lies in his own element, which adds to other factors to make him
unsuitable for the Presidency.
As if not knowing that removing
the beam in his own eyes would solve his personal problems than reaching out
for the speck that he sees in others’ eyes, he is all over the place, making
utterances that have very serious boomerang effects on him instead of hurting
the target(s) of his vitriol.
We wonder if he knows where he is
pushing himself as he continues to make vexing utterances, one of which I
comment on next.
He
is reported to have “challenged the President to use his office as head of
security to deal with anybody engaged in any act of electoral violence and
promise, just as he [Nana Akufo Addo] has done, not to spill anyone's blood to
retain power” (Ghanaweb, December 2, 2012).
Ghanaians
will be wise to take with a huge pinch of salt his promise that “the NPP will
not have a hand in any act of violence in the December 7 presidential and
parliamentary elections.”
Have
we not already been given glimpses into what the NPP has up its sleeves? When
his followers in his own hometown (Kyebi) physically assaulted NDC supporters on
the occasion of President Mahama’s electioneering campaign rounds there, what
did Akufo-Addo say to prove that he is against violence?
Even
when in Kumasi for today’s political rally, what did he say to condemn the
violence that had occurred in Ashtown, Kumasi, in which the NPP’s MP for the
area featured?
Nothing.
He closed his mind to it. How, then, can he persuade us that he is against
political violence?
He
has allowed his tunnel vision to determine how he approaches issues. He
demonstrated so before signing the Kumasi Peace Pact, and did so again at Techiman,
even at the time that he was wasting his breath urging President Mahama to
desist from encouraging political violence. Here is the proof:
“Mr
Akufo Addo… cited recent incidents of electoral violence in some strongholds of
the opposition party and tasked President John Mahama to ensure that such cases
are investigated and the offenders dealt with if he is really committed to
peaceful elections.”
He
said the President, who is head of security, should also declare to Ghanaians
he won’t shed anyone’s blood to retain the presidency, insisting that “he
[Mahama] should say that to Ghanaians so that we will all know his preaching of
peace is not borne out of mere rhetorics.”
Lying
through his teeth, he said: “I have declared to the whole nation on your behalf
that should there be violence in this elections, the perpetrators will not be
from the NPP… We appeal to the president to tell same to his followers to
desist from acts of violence for I have said I wouldn’t want anybody to shed
his blood for me to become president of Ghana.”
Pathetic,
indeed. The problem with Akufo-Addo is that his self-righteousness has blinded
him to his own liabilities. That is why I doubt his honesty in the matter of political
violence.
Between
him and President Mahama, who is more belligerent, even to the extent of
demonstrating that element during the Presidential Debates organized recently
by the Institute of Economic Affairs? Which of them had the “pugilistic” public
posturing? Was it President Mahama or he (Akufo-Addo) who behaved like a
matador, gearing up to gore the political bull?
The
air of belligerence that he rouses around himself is too thick to miss. How can
he turn round to point accusing fingers at the good-natured, genial, and unassuming
John Dramani Mahama?
There
is every reason to conclude that Akufo-Addo can’t withstand pressure. He doesn’t
have the natural bent for anything contrary to what he considers to be his by virtue
of privilege or dynastic precedent (His father was a titular President in the 2nd
Republic who has passed the baton on to him to be President “at all cost” in
this 4th Republic—and that must be his entitlement to rabble-rouse for).
With
this mentality goading all his politicking, he is more than desperate to
realize his ambitions. Throwing caution to the wind, he is mustering all the
venom he can to pour on his rivals, especially President Mahama.
If
all goes well, he will soon come to realize the futility of such morbid
ambitions. At almost 70 years—and with one foot almost close to the grave
(after all the Bible says that God has given humanity only three score and ten
years on earth), he will fare better if he hastens slowly.
He
is just digging his own grave, daring Ghanaians to act against him if he fails to
fulfill his extravagant promises. I have known one thing about Ghanaians—that
they are quick to find fault and be relentlessly unforgiving. If for nothing at
all, the late Kutu Acheampong made it clear that “Ghanaians are difficult
people.” And he is right. They may also be accused of being ungrateful, which is
why developing the country is taking so long.
Akufo-Addo
may deceive himself that he is overflowing with patriotism or altruism to the
extent of investing himself in what he is doing now. I wish the end will
justify the means for him. Unfortunately, though, his wishes will not be horses
for any beggar to ride.
Now
that he has begun falling under the impact of a political platform, what else
lies ahead of him? He alone may have the answer to the Biblical question: How are
the mighty fallen?
As
for me and my household, we have already rejected him. How about you?
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