Tuesday,
October 30, 2012
The proposal by Dr. David Percy, a leading member of the
National Reform Party (NRP), that all Presidents refrain from directing
national security during every election is unacceptable. In sum, it is
not only absurd but dangerous and inadmissible for several reasons.
What
is the rationale behind Dr. Percy’s proposal? He “believes such a move will be
a major step in addressing transparency among security officials and insecurity
of ballot boxes during elections” (Ghanaweb, October 28, 2012).
Transparency
in national security matters and security for ballot boxes? Who says there is
anything opaque going on that is a problem for a non-security expert like Dr.
Percy to diagnose and prescribe this kind of solution on? I don’t see it.
Let’s
hear him again say that “for every national election for which the president is
standing, [he] has to recuse himself. The president would have to stand aside
from directing the National Security. He is a candidate.”
If he steps aside,
who takes over from him as the Commander-in-Chief? Dr. Percy himself? This
suggestion is a recipe for national disaster, especially during the election
period when tension will definitely be at its peak. Who will be in charge of
national security, then? Nobody?
At this point, I
will simply say that Dr. Percy’s suggestion is more problematic than the
problem he might see where none exists.
He worsened his
opinions by ascribing fraud to the President in his role as the head of
national security. In seeing transparency as the basis for his proposal, Dr.
Percy thinks that ceding his role “will ensure
that there is transparency in the process so as not to create a situation where
the other parties will not trust the command system of the security services.”
Is
Dr. Percy accusing national security of masterminding malpractices such as the
stuffing of ballot boxes to favour the President’s party or that the snatching
of ballot boxes is the work of personnel of national security being manipulated
by the President?
These
are very serious claims that shouldn’t have been made at all, let alone by
someone who has nothing to do with national security to be able to know how it
functions. Stuffing ballot boxes or snatching them is the work of party
activists and hooligans on the payroll of party big wigs. These are the
miscreants to be tackled by national security.
Any
suggestion that being the person directing national security during elections
would give the President an undue advantage is misplaced and unfounded.
The
President has the constitutional mandate as the Commander-in-Chief of the Ghana
Armed Forces, invariably controlling all the country’s security apparatus. That
constitutional obligation is irrevocable and incontrovertible because the
President is the fount of authority. But it doesn’t give him any overarching
power to command and control national security to do what might have prompted
Dr. Percy’s proposal. Do we not have enough checks and balances to curb
anything of the sort?
We
have all these Councils for the security services either presided over by the
President or Vice President. What is the basis for any fear that there is lack
of transparency?
In
our particular situation in Ghana, we know very well how the President
exercises such powers, especially in consultation with the National Security
Council and through the chain of command in the various security
establishments.
In
this 4th Republic, we haven’t had any cause to suspect our
Presidents of bending the rule to suit their parochial political interests.
Despite fears that the Rawlings administration might use the military to thwart
the NPP’s bid for power at the various times, nobody could provide any evidence
that he indeed used the military to advantage during elections.
Rawlings’
peculiar metamorphosis from a military dictator to a civilian president, surviving
the elections in 1992 and 1996, may be given various interpretations but there
is no evidence that he used the security apparatus for political leverage
during the elections. Did we not hear reports that the election results in the
military installations (especially at the Burma Camp in Accra) didn’t favour
him? That the soldiers voted against him? What could he have done to reverse
anything unfavourable to him?
If
he were to manipulate the security apparatus, we would have cause to condemn
him. As a military officer himself, he was well positioned to manipulate the
situation but he didn’t; at least, we don’t have the evidence to that effect.
The
performance of the civilian Presidents who succeeded him doesn’t arouse any
fear that they are prone to abusing the constitutional mandate. Under the
Kufuor government, elections were held twice but no report emerged of any
attempt by him to manipulate the security apparatus to favour his NPP.
The
alarming broadcasts made by Radio Gold on the eve of the elections and the
run-off evaporated as mere speculative journalism. There was no evidence that
Kufuor had set anything in motion to use the military to prosecute any
self-serving agenda to cede power to Akufo-Addo.
Ex-President
Mills didn’t intend to use nor did he misdirect his constitutional mandate
toward abusing the constitutional mandate concerning national security. His
successor, John Mahama, isn’t doing so either.
Where
is the justification to support Dr. Percy’s apprehensions? I don’t see it.
Of
course, we know how unconscionable some politicians and their lackeys in the
security apparatus can be, especially if we consider how those opposed to
Nkrumah managed to infiltrate the ranks of the security services with foreign
backing to instigate Nkrumah’s overthrow.
Then
again, we know how the various military interventions in national politics were
masterminded. Even though the late Acheampong sought to abuse the military to
skew the political situation in his favour, he couldn’t succeed in pushing
through his agenda on the Union Government (UNIGOV).
Acheampong’s
case might be the only one to cite as an attempted abuse of the authority
invested in him as the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces; but he failed
terribly, and that belongs to history.
We
haven’t been fortunate enough to have civilian governments run their full terms
as we’ve had so far in the 4th Republic with three different Presidents
in office to oversee general elections. Rawlings and Kufuor presided over two
apiece and John Mahama will do so for the first time in December.
There
is no indication that being in charge of national security has given any of
these Presidents any urge to manipulate the situation to advantage. What is Dr.
Percy afraid of?
To be continued…
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