Monday, October 21, 2013
It is rare for
Ghanaian soldiers to be well-fated as has happened to Brigadier-General Joseph
Nunoo-Mensah, National Security Advisor, and former President Jerry John
Rawlings. Placed in the circumstances that have shaped and shaved their military
and civilian lives all these years, they come across as really plucky beneficiaries
of Lady Luck’s magnanimity.
Jerry Rawlings’
journey into the limelight is known and I won’t belabour it. Brigadier-General
Nunoo-Mensah’s is mired in inexplicable circumstances. We remember him as a
member of the Acheampong-led Supreme Military Council that metamorphosed into
SMC II after Acheampong’s overthrow in a palace coup masterminded by his own
henchmen, including Joshua Hamidu and Nunoo-Mensah.
When Rawlings and
his AFRC stormed the corridors of power, Brig-Gen. Nunoo-Mensah found favour and
was “grafted” a member only to resign later under murky circumstances. He
resurfaced in the camp of Rawlings’ political opponents and became the National
Security Advisor under ex-President Kufuor. It didn’t take long for him to
turn coat, which benefited him when ex-President Mills rehabilitated him as the
National Security Coordinator to be retained by President Mahama as such. Which
other military officer has been so lucky to serve across varied political
divides of this sort?
What about
Nunoo-Mensah has made him so indispensable to all these governments? Certainly,
a fulfilled career under a military title that is itself controversial in the
nomenclature of the Ghanaian military establishment? Calling him
BRIGADIER-GENERAL is disputable because the Ghanaian system has nothing of the
sort.
The ranking at the
senior level is from Colonel to Brigadier and to Major-General,
Lieutenant-General, General, and Field Marshall, in that ascending order of
importance. Where is this “Brigadier-General” from? Where does it fit in?
I don’t want to be
part of this controversy and will, therefore, simply call him Nunoo-Mensah (because
he is neither a Brigadier nor a Major-General. I know he hadn’t attained the
status of Lt-General or General before retiring from active service).
Anyhow, National
Security Coordinator Nunoo-Mensah is now the cynosure of all eyes, apparently
because of what he has brought upon himself, all of a sudden becoming the most
controversial public figure. The cause? He is reported to have “taken a swipe at workers in the country for consistently using
strikes to get their concerns addressed”. He made the comment when he spoke at
the commissioning of a nine-classroom block that he built for the O’reilly
Senior High School in Accra.
His utterances have a heavy political
dose; and it will take a brave politician to support him. In the current
situation, there are few of such brave politicians who can do so without any
fear of being “punished” at election time. Only the evergreen diplomat and
politician, K.B. Asante, has braved the storm to support him. All the rest have
chosen silence to be golden or joined the bandwaggon to condemn him for
political capital. The NPP is in the forefront.
I see much sense in Nunoo-Mensah’s
effusions, going beyond the aspects that have nettled his critics (“Every Tom, Dick and Harry gets up and
is calling for a strike. If you don’t want the job Ghana is not a police state,
take your passport and get out of this country” and “If you can’t sacrifice
like what some of us have don’t then get out. If the kitchen is too hot for
you, get out”).
For one thing, I
don’t consider Nunoo-Mensah as a heartless monster parading the corridors of
power to the detriment of organized labour or Ghanaians, generally. He is a
professional soldier charged with ensuring national security, stability, and progress;
and he has performed his duties meritoriously.
Thus, launching verbal
attacks against him and calling for his dismissal should
be done with circumspection. He must have been overwhelmed by frustration and
unmitigated anger to say what he said; but the implications of his utterances
should be weighed carefully and the bitter truth isolated from the raw, petulant
faux pas. I will unpack his utterances to tease out their true implications.
Some
salient aspects of his utterance must be made clear upfront. Nunoo-Mensah spoke
his mind and not that of the government whose National Security Advisor he
is. He spoke for himself, having assessed the situation from his own
perspective and satisfied himself that there was something worth saying about
the industrial actions and national development issues.
As
he made clear in his observation (“As I walk in the sun here from morning till
evening sometime I only drink orange juice to build a school for the future of
our children. Then some teachers say that they won't teach them because they
are on strike! It is very sad that we toil with the future of our children”),
the rationale behind industrial actions is intricate and should be understood
as such.
This
is a genuine outpouring of frustration that must be appreciated in its proper
context. He might have gone overboard in making other utterances; but the
substance of his effusions shouldn’t be missed. He did touch on some essential
elements that have been overshadowed by the irritating aspects.
In
the haste to tear his reputation into shreds, his opponents have side-stepped
the import of his utterance at other levels (for instance, “Government must
take immediate steps to address the incessant strikes in the country” and his
claim that the many strikes on the labour front are signs of a high-level
indiscipline in the country). Thus, it is no exaggeration to say that there is
too much indiscipline in the system, which negates efforts at national
development.
Who
will dispute the fact that there is too much indiscipline in the country? Which
country can develop in such an atmosphere of indiscipline, especially when
there is no respect for the laws of the land?
Unfortunately,
the good aspects of Nunoo-Mensah’s utterances are disregarded and the bad ones
uplifted for petty politicking, especially considering how opponents of the
government have latched on to the matter for peculiar purposes. Such is the
situation when everything tends to be politicized. In the heat of condemnation,
all that his critics are looking for is his blood!
Of
particular importance is his claim that “Until Ghanaians learn to sacrifice for
the nation, Ghana will never develop.” The attention that he drew to “sacrifice”
for the sake of nation building is clear and shouldn’t be missed. If for
nothing at all, he has revealed “sacrifice” to us as one major factor that is
crucial to nation building. The problem, however, is that if government
functionaries live in ostentation while the poor workers are forced to tighten
their belts, tempers will flare up when Nunoo-Mensah and others in positions of
privilege make such utterances.
Regardless
of whatever form this “sacrifice” might take, we need to know that self-denial
for the sake of the public good is an imperative, which we must take note of.
For that matter, I am prepared to pardon him and will advise all those tearing
him apart with their tongues to hasten slowly.
If
for nothing at all, the man himself has demonstrated that spirit of sacrifice,
building a 9-classroom block for the O’reilly Senior High School in Accra,
which he is not boasting of but standing on to exhort Ghanaians to emulate as
an instance of sacrifice. Of course, he is not asking anybody to build schools
as he has done; but the thrust of his effusions is to point us in a direction
to see sacrifice for the public good as beneficial. We may want to be told the
source of funding for the project, though!
Other
Ghanaians have made huge sacrifices and can be cited and appreciated for that
gesture. Though they might not stand on their philanthropy to say what
Nunoo-Mensah said, they could also silently be sending the message on sacrifice
for the common good. We can say that Nunoo-Mensah only carried his candidness
too far.
Of
course, Ghanaians know the value of sacrifice and wouldn’t expect to be so
brazenly “abused” as Nunoo-Mensah did. Thus, his harsh reminder might be least
expected, especially within the context of the genuine demands by organized
labour for better remuneration.
I shall return…
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