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Opinions of Saturday, 5 August 2023

Columnist: Rockson Adofo

Polarization of politics has rendered some Ghanaians ignorant and zombies! – part 1

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The body politics in Ghana has sadly rendered many a Ghanaian almost an inhibited person. Many such Ghanaians are so consumed by propaganda that they have become mentally blind to the reality and truth about issues but only to swallow them hook, line, and sinker, whatever their leaders throw at them. What a bunch of zombies!

Today, I am going it the tough way, speaking my mind as it should, without any ifs or buts.

I am getting fed up with how some Ghanaians residing abroad behave equally irresponsibly as their fellow partisan counterparts in Ghana.

Look at these two true cases below and judge for yourself what the people are, and how they should be seen and classed.

There is a fellow Ghanaian counterpart at my workplace. He works in a different department and for a different company. He is by his actions and pronouncements a typical NDC fanatic. I don’t want to mention his tribal extraction to avoid any expressions of prejudicial sentiments from whomever.

This fellow Ghanaian has cultivated that most despicable, if not the bushman’s, attitude, of always approaching me in the presence of my white work colleagues in a raised voice, as though he was readying for a fight, to announce to them with a finger-pointing at me, “His government and president are fucked. They don’t know what they are doing. They have spoiled the country. They have stolen all the money, etc.”

He will keep ranting and raving like a bitter man whose wife or girlfriend has painfully been snatched away from him by another man. Whenever he does that and I start to walk away from his hostile environment, he will tell them, “Look, he is running away because he has no defense to put up”

These white colleagues will not say a word because they don’t know where he is coming from and heading towards such seeming bestial attacks on the Ghana government and me.

They look shocked! They are not interested in Ghana politics. It is of total irrelevance to them so why should they be interested in his public demonstrations of a typical uncivilized African doing his monkey tricks (mischievous behavior)?

Is it the way politics is done? Why can’t he after his over twenty years residing in the United Kingdom learn to behave as a human being when it comes to doing politics?

If he has any differences, why can’t he discuss it with me alone but always in the presence of white work colleagues who have absolutely no interest in Ghana politics?

He appears to be over the moon about Ghana facing untold economic challenges. Since it is not the political party and government he supports that are facing such economic challenges, the problems had better come to stay! What a nutter and a malicious nonentity he is!

There is this second Ghanaian of a different tribal extraction other than that of mine or the people in the first case. He lives a few blocks away from where I live.

Whenever we come across each other in the street, he will ask, thus, “How are you? How is your family? How is Nana Akufo-Addo? How is Ghana going, etc.?

When I answer fine, he will then teasingly say, “Nana Akufo-Addo and your NPP government have spoiled the country”.

When I ask him to explain how they have spoiled the country, he begins to talk about the economic hardships people are going through in the country come about as a result of the perceived economic mismanagement of the country by President Nana Akufo-Addo and his NPP government.

When I ask him if he knew why and how prices of essential commodities, etc., have gone up, he will reply, I know you will be mentioning the COVID-19 pandemic and the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war.

When I ask him about the sharp increases in prices of goods and services in his own United Kingdom backyard for the past two to three years, he fumbles for words.

I would point out to him as follows, “Two big broilers sold for £5.00 pre-COVID-19 and Russia-Ukraine, are now selling for £5.00 a broiler at some street markets and £6.00 at others. Again, a bottle of 5-liter Sunflower oil sold at £3.99 before the coronavirus pandemic and the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war is now selling for £10.00 to £12.00 depending on which shop you buy it from”

When I told him that about three weeks ago, I bought a 5-liter bottle of Sunflower oil from Asda supermarket for £12.00, he said it is now selling for £8.00 in some shops.

Without the need for engaging a fool in an argument, I asked him, “Has the price not doubled even at £8.00 since it was selling for £3.99 before the COVID-19 and the Russia-Ukraine war?

Have the COVID-19 and the Russia-Ukraine war not affected many countries including the United Kingdom, the USA, France, and Ghana, just to mention a few countries?

When it comes to the two phenomena impacting the economies of the UK, these two irrational NDC fanatics do accept it but when you equate the situation to Ghana’s, they straight away say no, Ghana’s is down to the mismanagement by President Nana Akufo-Addo and his NPP government.

What annoys me most is the fact as soon as they see me, being an Ashanti, straightaway they see and tag me as a member of NPP hence they have every reason to mock me for the perceived economic failure of the NPP government.