Friday,
December 21, 2012
The NPP’s “Concert Party” show is providing enough humour to
entertain us; but it is based on one very ugly and damning foundation that must
be condemned by all peace-loving Ghanaians.
The NPP leaders’ constant disparaging of the Electoral
Commissioner, Dr. Kwadwo Afari Gyan, is reprehensible. Behaving as if they have
chosen him for a special vengeance, they have subjected him to all forms of
verbal abuse, curses, and vain threats ever since it became clear that their
Akufo-Addo and many NPP Parliamentary candidates had lost Election 2012.
Instead of seeing themselves as the cause of their candidate’s
electoral woes, they have metamorphosed into adrenaline-filled matadors,
roaming the political landscape, seeking whomever to destroy. In their
characteristic “mate me ho” element, they have isolated the Electoral
Commissioner to gore out of existence. It is disgraceful for them to behave
this way, and I unreservedly condemn them.
For all they may care to know, Afari Gyan has selflessly served
the country in his role and will bow out a proud and successful public servant.
He reminds me of the late Isaac Abban (Electoral Commissioner in the late 1970s),
who stood his grounds against the late Acheampong’s attempt to manipulate the
referendum on his Union Government proposal. Justice Abban swiftly vamoosed and
sought refuge from Acheampong’s rampaging agents. But he insisted that the results
showed that Ghanaians had overwhelmingly rejected Unigov. It didn’t take long
for Acheampong himself to end miserably.
Afari Gyan has not had that experience even though conditions
existed at one time or the other for unscrupulous people to threaten him
because their parties or candidates lost the elections. The fact that he has
been in office since 1992 to help us vote in an atmosphere of peace and tranquility
is commendable.
He deserves better than the crude behaviour by these sore losers
banded together under the peewee Akufo-Addo who mistook appearance for being
only to be rejected by the electorate. They still cannot humble themselves to soberly
reflect on the inadequacies that caused their defeat; nor will they be
politically astute enough to do a proper appraisal of the Ghanaian electorate
in preparation for Election 2016. Instead, they see their defeat as an act of
mischief and are venting their spleen on Afari Gyan.
Why are they tormenting his life? It is simply because they are
very horrible characters who don’t have the capacity to play a game fairly and
accept the results in the end. As mere fiery, fast-talking, conservative “democrats,”
they should have known better not to deepen their woes by resorting to this
kind of waywardness. But they will not do otherwise because sportsmanship is
not their forte.
It is not strange for losers of any game of chance to find
fault, especially in considering the circumstances leading to their defeat.
Often, they blame those who officiated the game for being biased against them.
Hardly do the losers blame their own incompetence or self-created problems as
the cause of their defeat. So is it with the NPP as it continues to drag
Afari-Gyan in the mud as the cause of the party’s woes at Election 2012.
To me, the NPP leaders’ rush to point accusing fingers at Afari Gyan
raises very serious questions that defy answers at this stage in our assessment
of Election 2012.
Why do these NPP functionaries think that Afari-Gyan would
collude with President Mahama, the NDC, and the media to rig the elections in
favour of President Mahama? What did Afari Gyan stand to gain by helping
President Mahama win the elections? What about the NPP made it repugnant to
him? What about Akufo-Addo repelled Afari Gyan that much as to warrant his
condoning and conniving with the NDC administration to deny him the Presidency?
The overarching question, after all, is: Having superintended
over five general elections since his appointment in 1992 by the Rawlings
administration, what did Afari Gyan stand to gain from rigging the sixth one
prior to his retirement? Or should we say that he wanted to end his career on a
bad note and, therefore, encouraged malpractices to win the day for President
Mahama? Personally, what would be his motivation for anything of the sort?
I am glad that the NPP and its allies (the PPP, NDP, etc.) that
are leading the spate of verbal attacks and issuing of threats against Afari Gyan
haven’t so far told us that he was bought by the government to skew the
elections in its favour. I have heard some NPP followers say that he was bribed
with 35 million Cedis to rig the elections; but that allegation is not worth my
bother because it has no basis in anything verifiable. It is just a dangerous
rumour being circulated as part of the grand agenda of destroying Afari-Gyan’s
reputation.
As the vilification intensifies, I am worried that the NPP is setting
a very bad precedent. Instead of attacking Afari Gyan this way, the NPP should
just have done the right thing by proceeding to court to challenge the outcome
of the elections, which was exactly what Afari Gyan had told them when they
first bared their teeth at him. Going to court would not warrant any personal
attacks on him; but the NPP is dilly-dallying for reasons best known to it.
On top of that, its leaders are levelling accusations against
Afari Gyan, one of which is that he is manouevring to hold secret meetings with
the NPP’s polling agents with the view to influencing them so that they don’t
reveal any malpractice that might have come to their notice at the polling
stations. Even though the Electoral Commissioner has come out openly to deny
any such manouevre, the NPP leaders are still adamant that the EC is attempting
to corrupt the party’s agents and, thereby, erase evidence being assembled for
the court case.
Another allegation is that the EC is erasing the data on the
biometric verification machines and resetting everything to zero, wiping off
evidence that the NPP considers vital to its intended court case. The EC has
denied that allegation too, but the NPP leaders are unfazed in their campaign of
character assassination and the issuing of vain threats against Afari Gyan.
That is the nature of such characters who regard the Presidency
as an entitlement and don’t have the capacity to tolerate anything to the
contrary. What has happened to them must definitely be blamed on Afari Gyan,
which is why they are unrelenting in attacking him. Are these the democrats to
be proud of?
I shall return…
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E-mail:
mjbokor@yahoo.com
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