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Opinions of Wednesday, 11 November 2020

Columnist: Kwabena Aboagye-Gyan

This has nothing to do with conscience, Mr Greenstreet

Ivor Kobina Greenstreet, CPP Presidential Candidate Ivor Kobina Greenstreet, CPP Presidential Candidate

It is not exactly clear the reason behind the belligerent protestation by Mr Ivor Greenstreet, the presidential candidate of CPP, that voting for NPP or NDC constitutes selling of conscience, and pleads with Ghanaians to stop voting for them because they are responsible for the terribly low-level of development of mother-Ghana (See: “Don’t sell your conscience to NPP, NDC – CPP pleads”, Ghanaweb.com).

For Mr Greenstreet to have pontificated that our woes should be imputed to the two political giants is a clear indication of the fact that he and his team presumptuously envisage themselves to wield the competence, if not the power, to steer the affairs of the country to the Promised Land. Those who are pathologically star-struck, with their admiration for the CPP emanating from cogent rationality, rather than sheer emotions or sentimentality (at least, from their perspective), see absolutely nothing wrong with it. No wonder they take delight in voting for the CPP – the third and necessary force as they call it – all the time, although they woefully fail to convince other people to join them say no to the NPP-NDC hegemony.

There is absolutely no doubt that the NDC and NPP think the country revolves around their proclivities and ideological suasions. For their supporters, anything else is vehemently proscribed and lucidly labelled as an indelible blight on the reputation of the person involved, as much as it is regarded as injurious to the development of our country. Many are those who have vociferously contested them in elections, but failure has always been their ignoble bed-mate. The terribly painful part is the fact that they have ruled Ghana for several years with nothing to show for it: no major positive impact in our lives. This ought to open the eyes of all those who will have their hegemony apotheosized as Ghana’s two dominant political parties of our time, to the stark fact that, in terms of selflessness, pro-activeness, decisiveness and competence, they are nowhere near the 50% mark.

It must be stressed in the record books the incontrovertible fact that the CPP has never justified people’s confidence in them. I have made it categorically clear in myriad avenues that the operatives of the CPP have performed apocalyptically poorly, since time immemorial, and should not expect to be regarded as a nonesuch Ghanaian political force to reckon with. Suffice it to say that disappointment has always been the menacing portion of those who vote for the CPP. For a party which always obtains less than 2% of votes in elections, as NPP and NDC always obtain more than 40%, it can never be said that voting for either the NPP or NDC constitutes selling of conscience.

Then also, it is obvious that Mr Greenstreet and the members of the CPP do not learn remarkably well with time. As far as I can anachronistically decipher, they have never had any clear-cut policy they sell to the good people of Ghana to warrant their votes. It would be perspicaciously right for our dear CPP to come out clearly with the policies, or at least a policy, they intend to bring on board that would inure to the benefit of Ghanaians.

Well, it is not erroneous for Mr Greenstreet to brazenly orchestrate the flagrant demolishing of the NPP-NDC hegemony. However, although I am sceptical about their capability of taking us to the Promised Land, I do not think voting for them is tantamount to the sale of conscience. I sincerely do not believe that he and his diehard supporters have seriously pondered the far-reaching and blistering political implications of his assertion. And on that score, he clearly appears to be more than a bit wanting.