Rejoinder: EP Church

Dear Mr. Opare-Asamoa,

Why have you sought to give a dog a bad name in order to hang it? Why would you go back into history, pick an innocuous piece of information, twist and sensationalize it in order to make your fellow brothers and sisters of the Ewe ethnic group look bad and tribalistic? Please, tell me, and others who read your article, what hidden motives compelled you to write your divisive and provocative article? Have you tried to draw any positive parallels between the EP Church and the Church of England or the Roman Catholic Church?

I may be wrong but you come across as, either a closet tribalist with a strong anti-Ewe psychosis or you are a very sloppy writer who engages his pen and keyboard before engaging his brain.

Or could you possibly be just a divisive nation-wrecker who does not value the unity and diversity that all Ghanaians of all ethnic affiliations enjoy?

Please, pardon my language, but it is people of your ilk who generate and fan flames of tribal or ethnic hatred plus prejudice and the politics of exclusion in our times. It is divisive simpleton writers like you who coin phrases like “Volta Virus” to describe a whole group of peace-loving and one-nation Ghanaians. I guess it is people of your type who try to justify and pacify your ethnic hatred and prejudice of others by reducing your fellow Ghanaians to objects that must be destroyed or eliminated. It is your kind of rushed, un-researched, un-nuanced and superficial writing that sows seeds of hatred and prejudice against innocent law-abiding Ghanaian women, children and men.

First of all you could have done your home work by: Simply doing a Google search of “EP Church Ghana’. You will find several useful sites with facts to help you answer the questions arising from your twisted thinking and divisive labeling. Maybe these links can help you http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evangelical_Presbyterian_Church,_Ghana and http://www.oikoumene.org/gr/member-churches/regions/africa/ghana/evangelical-presbyterian-church-ghana.html and http://www.globalministries.org/africa/partners/evangelical-presbyterian.html and http://www.answers.com/topic/evangelical-presbyterian-church-ghana Contact the Headquarters of the EP Church Ghana to have an interview with the Moderator (or any of the top members) before you published your falsehood against the EP Church. Their details are: Evangelical Presbyterian Church, Ghana, PO Box 18, Ho Volta Region, Ghana (Africa), Telephone: +233 91 26755, Fax: +233 91 28275, Email: epchurch@ghana.com,

Please do your homework and you would find on the internet things like, “The EPC runs 196 nursery and 341 primary schools, 89 junior secondary and five senior secondary schools and two teacher training colleges. It is actively involved in quality health delivery services at strategic places in the country, with two hospitals and seven clinics as well as a very effective mobile clinic. An agricultural extension programme gives technical guidance to farmers and small self-help projects aim at empowering the marginalized through revolving loans.”

Did you check to see if any non-Ewes or non-EP people have been denied benefits from these institutions managed by the EP Church? Did you try to check to see how many non-Ewes, non-EP people or even non-Ghanaians have received excellent-quality education Mawuli School, a respected EP institution in Ho.

In fact, your hogwash of a feature article should not merit a response or rebuttal but for the consideration that “A lie left unchallenged becomes HISTORY”. With your totally misleading and un-researched article you sought to portray Ewes as tribalists who have formed their own “tribal” church. You wrote, “The composition of the church still remains ‘uni-ethnic’” – How did you arrive at this fallacy and falsehood? Have you tried to visit any of the EP churches in the Eastern, Ashanti, Central and other regions outside the Volta Region to see how their services are conducted? Have you checked any of the top EP secondary schools or hospitals to see how “uni-ethnic” they are?

You asked, “So what was responsible for such a decision by the Ewes?” You could have put your anti-Ewe sentiments aside and simply googled “EP church” to discover the history of the EP Church. By the way, have you heard of the Global Evangelical Church? Why didn’t you contact the Secretariat of the EP Church in Accra for the right information?

Your wrote: “Isn’t it time for the church to consider de-tribalising?” This is simply a case of giving a dog a bad name in order to hang it. What would say about Kristo Asafo and other Akan or Twi-based churches all over Ghana?

You write about the church need to foster “unity and harmony amongst people” but have you checked to document any tribalistic acts committed by the EP church in Ghana? Did the hospitals owned and managed by the EP church refuse treatment to non-EP or non-Ewe patients? Have you checked on the EP church’s humanitarian and community activities?

You write about meeting “the standards of our Lord Jesus Christ.” And I have to tell you that your writing falls far short of any standards of the LORD. It falls far short of responsible and unifying journalistic ethics.

Remember that most Ewes do not worship in the EP Church. The vast majority of Ewe Christians are worshipping in other churches, including the Roman Catholic Church and the new charismatic/Pentecostal churches. Many of us worship in Twi (and Ga) in these churches.

I could go on and on, but time does not permit me. Many Ghanaians have sacrificed, and even died, for all of us to enjoy the level of unity in diversity that we have in our dear nation today. So please do not try to sow your seeds of ethnic discord among us.

I think at this point you should reflect on Ephraim Amu’s Yen’ ara asase ni or Mia Denyigba.

Please, desist from stigmatizing Ewes and other ethnic groups in Ghana. Please, refrain from using your writing skills to divide our people and our nation.

A word to the wise should be enough. But I’m not sure about you right now. I really hope that you and your potentially destructive ilk can somehow prove me (and other unifying, inclusive, progressive and peace-loving Ghanaians and pan-Africans) wrong.

Yen’ ara asase ni. Mia Denyigba, by Dr. Ephraim Amu of the EP Church – of blessed memory.