Vomit Woyome Cash - Rawlings Tells Mills

The founder of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) and former President, Jerry John Rawlings, has set a tall order for President Atta Mills within the next two months before he (Rawlings) will join the 2012 campaign of the NDC.

Chief among the conditions is that the GH¢51.2 million fraudulently paid to Alfred Agbesi Woyome for his so-called ‘financial engineering’, when there is no proof of work done for the government, should be refunded within the next two months, possibly before the next celebration of June 4, sources close to the meeting held with Volta regional chiefs have told Daily Guide.

The Volta chiefs had met with Mr. Rawlings and his wife, Nana Konadu Agyeman-Rawlings, at his Ridge office on Tuesday with the intention of brokering peace between the two leading figures of the ruling party, but the meeting was inconclusive, according to Michael Teye Nyaunu, MP for Lower Manya, who sat through the over three-hour meeting.

According to Mr. Rawlings, he did not see how he could mount an NDC platform within the tenets of the probity and accountability philosophy of the NDC if the money was not returned promptly.

This is the first time the former president is commenting on the controversial Woyome saga which was rocked the government.

Daily Guide gathered the details of the meeting a day after Mr. Rawlings met the retinue of the chiefs from the Volta Region operating under the name ‘Royals for peace and development’ at his office in Accra.

Mr. Rawlings came out of the closed door meeting which started around 3pm till about 7:15pm drenched in sweat.

Among the several issues that emerged after the meeting was the former President’s discontent about the numerous unfulfilled promises of the Mils administration and the level of tension in the country which appeared to be more than what Kofi Adams, spokesperson for Mr. Rawlings, and the chiefs, Togbe Adela Adelakoe ll of Wheta, told a section of the press.

He asked the chiefs why for the first time in history, a simple voter registration exercise had generated so much tension in the country.

Mr. Rawlings asked for the removal of certain individuals and groups of persons from key and influential positions in both the party and government, including Central Regional Minister Comfort Ama Benyiwa Doe, Party General Secretary Johnson Asiedu-Nketia and Ato Ahwoi, who is seen as the defacto Prime Minister.

Others are the ‘Reform Boys’ Goosie Tanoh, Kyeretwie Opoku, and Dr. Obed Asamoah and Kojo Boakye Djan, the former AFRC member who recently joined the NDC and is standing as Jaman South parliamentary candidate.

According to the NDC founder, it would be very difficult to share the same platform with Boakye Djan because of the insults he had heaped on him.

Mr. Rawlings was said to have complained bitterly about how Benyiwa Doe embarrassed his wife, Nana Konadu, after the NDC congress in Sunyani.

He was said to have recalled with nostalgia how the Central Regional Minister caused a group of thugs to deny Mrs. Rawlings the mere opportunity to use the Cape Coast Town Hall where she was scheduled to meet and address some FONKAR members as part of her ‘thank you tour’ of the region, even though she had dully paid for it.

In the case of Mr. Asiedu Nketia, whose diminutive physic has earned him the nickname ‘General Mosquito,’ Mr. Rawlings said he could not foresee himself campaigning with the man who had referred to him as a ‘barking dog’.

As part of the pre-conditions, the NDC founder wanted the removal of Ato Ahowi an influential member of the Mills administration and head of the ‘kitchen cabinet’, from the key positions in government whilst the likes of Gossie Tanoh, Kyeretwie Opoku and Obed Asamoah and a host of others who left the NDC to form National Reform Party (NRP) and the Democratic People’s Party (DPP), and recently rejoined should be made to go back since he could not be in the same ship with individuals who had denigrated him on various platforms.

The former President was said to have told the chiefs in plain language that he could not in any way share the same platform with the Mills appointees unless they were sacked from the NDC.

He asked the chiefs whether they had passed through the Castle and found for themselves where the problem of the frosty relationship was coming from.

Mrs. Rawllings on her part asked the chiefs whether their mission was because they wanted them to be part of the NDC campaign simply because the election was getting closer. She said the insults they had received from Mills boys like Okudzeto Ablakwa, Felix Kwakye Ofosu, Alhaji Bature and others were too unbearable.