The aftermath of the release of ‘Working with Rawlings,’ a book by a close ally of former President Rawlings, was widely described by several people including some circles within the NDC party as dire.

Some stakeholders and political analysts even suggested that the timing of the publishing and release of the book by Prof Kwamena Ahwoi derailed the National Democratic Congress in the lead up to the December 2020 elections.

A Special Aide to the late former President Rawlings has averred that he believes the one-time close friend of his boss, may have had regrets about certain parts of the content of his book if he had anticipated the connotation the piece brought.

Dr Donald Senanu Gumenu, who until the demise of Mr Rawlings, had served as a Special Aide for about six years told GhanaWeb in an exclusive interview, that the release of the book brought some disappointment to the former President.

“To be very sincere with you, I believe, before I come to this, the author of the book, maybe after everything may have thought, could I have done this book in a better way?

“I believe the author of the book may have regretted for one or two things which maybe (I’m using maybe because I am not in his mind), he would have thought that if I had understood that President Rawlings would take this thing in this way or this would have been the connotation, I could have done it this way or that.”

The book which sought to chronicle the working and by extension, the personal relationship between the former Local Government Minister in the Rawlings administration and the then-President unveiled a lot of events which generated a lot of controversies, even within the NDC party.



Following the release of the book, former President Rawlings while reacting to some of the claims in the writeup, described the author as “generously economical with the truth.”

He, on a number of occasions, denied some of the claims in the book by Prof Ahwoi.

The former President went further to release a 15-paged response in reaction to the ‘Working with Rawlings’ book to address a number of claims he described as misconceptions and misrepresentations.

The response which was titled “The Integrity of Truth” was signed by Kobina Andoh Amoakwa and released by the Communications Directorate of Mr Rawlings’s office.