President Mills Wild!

President John Evans Atta Mills is reported to have gone haywire on Tuesday over an attempt to pin him down over the raging gay issue in the country, cutting short his re-election celebrations.

The President was said to have been wild about an article published in the Ghanaian Times soon after massively defeating Nana Konadu Agyeman-Rawlings, wife of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) founder, at the Sunyani congress of the party.

President Mills was said to have personally telephoned the Acting Editor of the Ghanaian Times to reprimand him over a recent publication in the state-owned newspaper of the raging homosexual issue, even though the story was originally a Ghana News Agency story.

According to sources at the Castle, the President called Charles Neequaye because he was not happy about the paper’s Tuesday July 12, 2011 banner headline, “We’ll stop the Gays – President”.

The news article, which had no by-line, quoted the President as saying that the government would institute measures to check the menace of homosexuality and lesbianism from gaining grounds within the social fabric of the country. However, his denial of the story on Tuesday raised questions about his position on homosexuality.

At a thanksgiving service on Sunday at the Sunyani Central Ebenezer Presbyterian Church of Ghana, after the President’s resounding victory over former First Lady Nana Konadu Agyeman-Rawlings in the NDC national delegates’ congress in Sunyani, the Minister-In-Charge of the church, Rev. Joseph Bosoma took advantage of the President’s visit to table four pressing social issues which in the view of the church, needed to be tackled by the government.

He particularly appealed to President Mills to help address the issues of homosexuality, indecent dressing among the youth, Ghana’s porous borders and the Fulani herdsmen menace.

Responding to the concerns raised by the Reverend Minister, the President, according to the report, promised to tackle the issue of homosexuality by stating that the acts were contrary not only to the word of God, but also the cultural norms and values of the Ghanaian society.

“The word of God is clear and unambiguous; what is right is right, what is wrong is wrong,” President Mills was quoted by the paper as saying.

Daily Guide learnt that Mr. Neequaye was in his office on Tuesday when a phone call came through from Koku Anyidoho, Communications Director at the Presidency, asking him to “hold the line” for the “old man”.

Mr. Anyidoho was said to have handed over the phone to President Mills who complained bitterly about the publication and told the Editor that he did not make those comments attributed to him by the newspaper. Attempts to speak to Koku failed.

The Ghanaian Times had no option but to retract the story and apologize to President Mills in its Wednesday July 13, 2011 issue.

The telephone conversation, according to sources, was facilitated by a colleague Editor at the Ghanaian Times who was disqualified recently by the NTC board when the commission interviewed applicants for the post of a substantive Editor for the paper.

The said colleague Editor, seen as a sympathiser of the NDC, is allegedly lobbying in the corridors of power to become the substantive Editor.

It was the same colleague Editor who ‘liaised’ with the Castle for the publication of a recent story that sought to create the impression that Okyeman had endorsed President Mills for a second term, sparking a heated political debate over what was actually said by a chief when President Mills toured the Eastern Region recently.

The man is said to be the eye of the Castle at Ghanaian Times.

Meanwhile, the Minister-In-Charge of Sunyani Central Ebenezer Presbyterian Church of Ghana, Rev Joseph Bosoma, has stated that President Mills at the said church service promised to do something about the homosexuality menace in Ghana.

Rev Joseph Bosoma told Daily Guide on Thursday that President Mills however did not categorically mention that he was going to enact laws to outlaw homosexuality which is creeping into the Ghanaian society.

“He only promised that he will do something about it when I raised the issue before him. But as to what he was going to do he did not mention it here,” Rev Bosoma told Daily Guide.

The reverend minister further stated that the President however issued a strongly-worded statement against the menace and further assured the congregants that he would do something about it. “The entire church was happy because the President responded positively to my request,” he added.

The Mills administration is yet to make clear its official position on homosexuality despite the numerous calls on the government to come out with stringent laws to ban the menace.