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Opinions of Monday, 18 July 2016

Columnist: Okoampa-Ahoofe, Kwame

Colin Bloom had it down pat, Hanna Tetteh

Hanna Tetteh Hanna Tetteh

She can huff the fury of ocean waves, but there is absolutely no gainsaying the fact that Ghanaians deserve far better than they are presently getting from the faux-socialist Mahama-led payola-chomping government of the National Democratic Congress (NDC).

And so it is rather amusing that Foreign Minister Hanna Tetteh would be miffed by Mr. Colin Bloom’s observation in Accra, during the recent confab of the International Young Democratic Union (IYDU), that Ghanaians deserve far better than the NDC’s political scam-artists are maliciously and viciously visiting upon their heads (See “Mind Your Own Business – Hanna Tetteh Tells Top UK Politician” Classfmonline.com / Ghanaweb.com 7/3/16).

Other than promiscuously taking to Twitter and badmouthing one foreign dignitary or diplomat after another, as she recently did to the immediate-past U.S. Ambassador to Ghana, there is not much that is either progressive or enlightening that the University of Ghana Law School-trained social climber is widely known for, unless, of course, one counts her infamous solicitation of a physical plant bribe, in the form of an elementary school building, that Ms. Tetteh had the Chinese Ambassador to Ghana build in her Awutu-Senya Constituency, in celebration of her birthday early this year.

Indeed, between Ms. Tetteh and President John Dramani Mahama, all that Ghanaians have to show for economic or material development are the Ford Expedition payola scam shamelessly cadged by the former Atta-Mills Vice-President from Monsieur Gibril (Djibril) Kanazoe, the Burkinabe contractor ceded several no-bid contracts by the Mills-Mahama and presently the Mahama/Amissah-Arthur regime; and the Chinese school building bribe and the lone Senior High School building reportedly constructed by President Mahama, out of some 200 high schools promised Ghanaian voters some four years ago.

To-date, these are the only real development projects that the much-rumored political couple have to show for their four-year residency at the Flagstaff House.

And so when Mr. Colin Bloom, the Outreach Director of Britain’s Conservative Party, calls Nana Akufo-Addo the next president of Ghana, Ghanaian voters had better sit up and listen. Among the Akan, there is a savvy maxim that says that “The path-maker often does not realize when the path s/he is cutting is crooked. It takes a passerby to point out this constructional error.” This is precisely what he was doing, when Mr. Bloom cautioned Ghanaians against any mistake to return the payola-grubbing Mahama Posse to the Flagstaff House.

To be certain, no postcolonial Ghanaian government has wrecked more public and private enterprises and small businesses with Dumsor than the regime headed by the so-called Lone Northern Hope.

About the only product that the NDC government has produced more than enough for export is tribalism. Nearly every significant cabinet portfolio, until just the last three or four months, was held by either a northern-descended Ghanaian or one of the freeloading Trokosi Nationalists from the Anlo-Ewe enclave of the Volta Region.

And so wherein does Mr. Bloom err, as Ms. Tetteh would have Ghanaians believe, when the Tory leader admonishes them to look towards their own best interests? Yes, Ms. Tetteh is right in saying that Britain’s Conservative Party leadership has its own fair share of challenges. What she ought to have promptly added, were she an honest and patriotic Ghanaian citizen, is the fact that “professional beggarliness” is not one of the perennial challenges facing the Tory leaders.

In Ghana, what we have are organized thugs robbing the hardworking and humble taxpayers left, right, front, back and center. And, oh, I forgot to add: The Mahama Posse have our so-called Independent Electoral Commission rigged up to make a practical nonsense of the age-old and time-tested credo of “One Person, One Vote.”

This is the Ghana that Ms. Tetteh and her boss, Lover Boy Dramani, do not want the outside world to know about. Alas, in the age of global diplomacy, such wishful thinking can only be properly chalked to foolish pride.