Editorial: Rawlings & The NRC

Without doubt that day will be the high point of the public hearings of the National Reconciliation Commission (NRC), if not its entire work.

Yes, that will be the day when ex-head of state, Flight-lieutenant (Dr) Jerry John Rawlings, will appear before the NRC to reply to allegations, allegedly both founded and unfounded, levelled against him by critics/petitioners, especially concerning the planning and execution of the dastardly and cold-blooded murder of three High Court Judges and a retired Army Captain.

But as edifying and healing as Dr Rawlings’ presence at the NRC would be, we are against any attempt to coerce such attendance.

This is why we deplore the sabre-rattling from the NRC, especially the news that hit the airwaves shortly after the Christmas festivities that a subpoena has been issued to compel Mr Rawlings to go before the commission and that if he failed to do so he might be cited for contempt.

Particularly below the belt was Executive Secretary’s answer to a question that he did not think ex-President Rawlings would refuse to return to the country from his current trip abroad, as a result of the subpoena served on him. What was the essence of that information? Are there some people who would rather prefer the ex-President left the country for them? That is the suggestion that comes across from the question to which he gave that response.

Should Mr Rawlings refuse to honour the NRC subpoena, he certainly would not be the first former African head of state to have done so. He will be joining the ignominious club of ex-heads of state who take delight in putting themselves above the laws of their own countries.

Piet Botha of South Africa and Generals Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida and Muhammadu Buhari, both of Nigeria, easily come to mind. Botha fought the Archbishop Desmod Tutu-led Truth and Reconciliation Commission of his country to the courts and defied the courts when it came to testifying before that body. While Nigeria’s Buhari simply ignored the invitation, Babangida, true to his maradonic accolade, made his attendance conditional: he said the sort of security deployment that would guarantee his personal security in volatile Lagos would cost N3 million a day (about ?150 million), and he would only make himself available if that could be provided. Of course, no one gave that commitment.

But the vital and instructive lesson here for the NRC is that those supposedly “gentlemen and officers” of the Nigerian Army were not threatened in any way with committal orders, but were left to their consciences.

Was that attitude adopted by the incumbent political and military leaders of Nigeria because of cowardice?

No! But as a practical demonstration of the axiom that discretion is often the best part of valour. That is, in a country where those ex-heads of state made no attempt at instituting a personality cult. Should we behave differently here, where the opposite circumstance appears to be the case?

Mr Rawlings shot his way onto our political scene on a moral crusade to hold accountable his superiors in the military that had mismanaged their intrusion into Ghana’s political life, and in the process discredited the military. And he did, in his own way or that of his support base: he shot eight of them at the stakes to death.

Viewed from this moral crusade perspective, should Mr Rawlings refuse to appear before the NRC he would be suggesting one of two things or both: Either his moral anger was a smokescreen used to mask his envy of the political elite, both military and civilian, or he lost focus after tasting the fleshpot of power; that it was after this degeneration from the moral high ground that he connived at the atrocities that have been alleged against him by the various witnesses at the NRC.

If Mr Rawlings would spurn the NRC and allow these suggestions to take root in the minds of the public, that would be his own cup of tea. And the NRC, with all the brains available to it, ought to know that it would be counter productive to take any precipitate action that would make a man who would have discredited himself by his own inability to measure up to the standard with which he had judged others, to present himself as a victim.

And even if Mr Rawlings should be subpoenaed at all, we wonder if the NRC is not putting the cart before the horse. At what point should he be invited. It would seem to make sense that he should be the last, after all possible evidence against him has been gathered in. That way he goes in once and attends to all queries.

The way they are going about it, Mr Rawlings would constantly have one leg inside the NRC venue and one at his residence. Every time a word was said against him, he would be called to go and respond.

That in our view would amount to harassment. And that would tend to give credence to the claim by the NDC that the NRC has a hidden purpose – to discredit their leader and founder.

The members of the NRC have a duty to disabuse the minds of the thinking public of any such suggestions, and one way of doing that could be putting a leash on the way they have been handling some of their public relations jobs. Their statements suggest that they want to take a confrontation and combative approach. Knowing the theory of reconciliation exercises is not the same as executing one. Each ought to be carried out with due recognition to the environment in which it is carried out – its history, strengths and weaknesses – and no foreign models should be imported from one reconciliation exercise. So let those whose duty it is to reconcile us be minded by our environment, political atmosphere and lead us not into temptation.