Nobody in charge? President & Vice Create Power Vacuum

Mills Is Hiding Something — NPP

PRESIDENT ATTA Mills returns from South Africa today and the opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) says it is untrue that he went there “to hold talks with the South African Government,” as his Communications Director, Koku Anyidoho, would want Ghanaians to believe.

The development comes days after the Minority in Parliament raised red flags that President Mills has been sneaking out of the country and consistently flouted the constitutional requirement that he must notify Parliament anytime he wants to travel outside the country.

At the time the President left the shores of the country, there was nobody in charge of the country as the Vice President, John Mahama, was outside the jurisdiction, creating power vacuum in the country.

While the President was airborne, his Vice was returning to the country from South Africa, where he had gone to watch football games, even though the President had earlier sounded that officials should not travel to South Africa for the mundial.

The Speaker of Parliament, who was supposed to be sworn in to take charge until the Vice president returns, only got the notification about the President's trip after he had left.

The power vacuum was a subject of controversy in Parliament as the National Democratic Congress (NDC) tried to play it down, with Minority NPP insisting that it was a terrible blunder committed by the President.

The NPP, in a news release signed by its Communications Director, Kwaku Kwarteng, said while President Mills left for South Africa on Thursday, June 24, 2010, and is expected to return to Ghana on Monday June 28, 2010, South African President, Jacob Zuma, travelled out of South Africa on Wednesday, 23rd June and was not expected back until Monday, 28th June, so there was no way the two Presidents could have held talks.

“We believe the President is hiding something…. It is obvious that the true reason for President Mills' visit to South Africa is not to hold discussions with the Zuma Government.

President Mills cannot hold meetings with President Zuma in South Africa when President Zuma and his top officials are in Canada, along with other African leaders who were invited to attend the G-20 Summit.

“This is a matter of public interest: Why should the Mills Government lie about the true reason for the President's visit to South Africa? What is there to hide?

We are not questioning the President visiting South Africa, but Ghanaians deserve to know what has taken him to South Africa,” the NPP release noted.

Meanwhile, a number of government officials have explained that the fact Jacob Zuma was out of the country does not mean President Mills could not have held fruitful meetings with other senior officials of the South African government.

Koku Anyidoho, President Mills' Communications Director, has also explained that the South African trip was a follow-up of the visit of President Eduardo Dos Santos, Head of State of Angola, and matters that have arisen out of the visit.

He added that the upcoming AU summit to be held in Kampala, Uganda, between the 24th and 27th of July, 2010, is another reason for President Mills' visit to the Rainbow country.

The NPP would however not take that explanation and rather insinuated in the Kwarteng-signed statement that President Mills might have travelled to South Africa to seek medical attention.

“We believe the President is not being truthful to Ghanaians. As has been the case in the past, is President Mills in South Africa for medical attention?

Ghanaians deserve an end to speculations about the President's health, and only the Presidency can do so,” the statement added.

By Halifax Ansah-Addo