By Kwarteng, Francis

“A politician who doesn’t generate controversy is a dull politician and that is not an interesting politics” (“Any Politician Who Doesn’t Generate Controversy is Dull—Akufo-Addo,” Ghanaweb, March 10, 2017).

THE ORWELLIAN ODDITY OF GHANA’S OPEN-DEFECATION DEMOCRACY

Ghana is theoretically a failed state, shrouded in the mystery of an empty political rhetorical, Lower-Middle-Income Country, whatever that is.

Even Mahamudu Bawumia’s reported assertion, largely of the order of partisan political convenience, that Akufo-Addo of all people strongly objects to being addressed as “His Excellency” is deeply suspicious, perhaps another calculated canard on the part of Bawumia to hoodwink the gullible into accepting the latter’s disguised status as a graceful redeemer of our fetid open-defecation democracy from the enemies of progress who feeds on the status quo—greasy friends of our arrested development and continued de-civilization.

Yet that transcendental decree for Akufo-Addo to totally divest himself of that titular designation may have come from on high, above, heaven—Angel Obinim.

“His Excellency” is reserved only for Angel Obinim, a redoubtable titular designation even Rev. Owusu Bempah is afraid to appropriate for himself.

And thus “His Excellency” Akufo-Addo becomes Angel Obinim in disguise.

Of course we will not feed on the general gullibility of Ghanaians is not helping matters, much less should the bootlicking Akufo-Addo.

They say change has come but change is actually never built on a wellspring of Orwellian sycophancy, where the latter merely in turn reinforces the status quo, of political inaction and institutional rot. Here’s Mr. President’s vision for change:

“Within 18 months, my government will transform Ghana and bring prosperity to every part of the country.”

But Senior Minister Yaw Osafo-Marfo seems to be saying else, implying that Ghanaians must cautiously re-examine his boss’s vision for change—for Ghana. The former says in part (“We Can’t Deliver All Promises in a Year—Osafo-Marfo,” Ghanaweb, March 10, 2017):

“If anyone thinks that all the pledges by government will be fulfilled in one year, then you are being utopian.”

Technically, Osafo-Marfo is right. “Twelve months” is already gone. And, we have six more months to go for the total transformation of Ghana, after which Akufo-Addo and his government will retire.

Furthermore, barring any major unforeseeable interferences in successfully implementing the political articulation of the NPP’s manifesto, we expect the budget for 2018 to bring Akufo-Addo’s prophecy of industrial transformation of Ghana, and of economic prosperity to Ghanaians, to a close, around June or July, of 2018.

In other words, the crystal-ball predictor of six months is the game changer. Then again time will tell if “eighteen months” is a utopian guesstimate of sorts. Here, we shall share parts of the prophetic wisdom of Bob Marley’s “Time Will Tell” with the ethnocentric hegemonist Osafo-Marfo:

“Think you’re living in heaven, but ya living in hell…

“Oh, my children are crying.

“Oh, children, weep no more!

“Oh, my sycamore tree, saw the freedom tree…

“Weep no more; children weep no more!

“Time alone—oh, time will tell…

We will surely know with time if Osafo-Marfo’s assertions are either a priori or a posteriori form of knowledge, but until then, let’s hope that, once again, he is not reading from a strange text of a political manifesto in aristocratic German—from a backwater salon, without a knowledgeable translator.

This is why constructive criticism must dog the government in power until it bends toward the compass of social justice, fairness and equity, and truth, which the popular will represents and advances. In the meantime Akufo-Addo’s populism, like Donald Trump’s, is indubitably sham!

Bob Marley called it “Crazy Baldhead”! Certainly, we are far from what Bob Marley called “Wake Up and Live.”

THE COUNCIL OF STATE AND A PRESSING NEED FOR CONSTITUTIONAL REFORMS

It is our submission that the government led by Akufo-Addo should consider undertaking constitutional reforms with a pronounced focus on making the Council of State more effective in terms of advisory muscularity, otherwise, his anti-bootlicking advice to this institution will carry no enforceable weight of strategic and tactical advisory presence.

In other words a theoretically reformed constitution should make this institution more than a ceremonial paper tiger, with a capacity for a muscular presence in executive governance and politics. It could even be made to share in executive governance to a certain extent. Otherwise it must be scrapped.

Yet constitutional reforms may not even be the answer to leadership crises. The anti-constitutionalism attitude of both the NDC and the NPP makes these progressive calls for constitutional reforms highly unlikely.

Both of these parties appear not to be interested in passing the Freedom of Information Bill (FOIB) or supplanting the Ghana Hybrid System (GHS) in favor of the Production Sharing Agreement (PSA).

Both of these parties have also made politics organized crime. In short, the NPP and the NDC are criminal organizations.

Now, look how the Akufo-Addo government is desperately trying to cash in on, or make political capital out of, the Marwako Restaurant controversy, even though we are not implying the government should ignore incidents of egregious mistreatment of Ghanaians.

Rather, what we are saying is that Ghanaians, particularly Ghanaian children, are literally held as “slaves” in the fishing, cocoa and mining industries across the country and yet, no one seems to care.

Imagine if these leaders have not turned our mineral wealth and oil-gas resources to foreigners on the cheap!

Imagine if these leaders are not grossly mismanaging the economy and stealing here and there, but rather using available funds in the public purse to develop human capital, to develop the country, and to create employment opportunities for all!

Imagine if our leaders were not greedy!

Imagine if our leaders shared the country’s wealth with all!

Listen to John Lennon’s “Imagine”:

“Imagine all the people living in peace…

“No need for greed or hunger

“A brotherhood of man

“Imagine all the people

“Sharing all the world….

But, in fine, we all know who Akufo-Addo is. He is a slimy historical revisionist, whose tendentious political rhetoric and trademark ahistoricism belittles Ghana’s political history, especially where the instrumental role of Kwame Nkrumah in dismantling colonialism in the Gold Coast and developing unitary Ghana is concerned, in favor of his relational or consanguineous political criminals of yore!

And now he is saying he wants the Council of State to be an “effective advisory body”! By whose standards? Was he not among those who contributed to a national constitution that has given birth to a nation drenched in what he described in his plagiarized inaugural speech as “Third World Standards”?

Is Mr. President suffering from historical amnesia, absentmindedness, or outright absence of mind? These are the kinds of men and women who make policies and laws that eventually come back to haunt us. This is why we are calling for a constitutional revolution that will make the Council of State and the executive of government more effective and responsible, for he cannot cry out for the Council of State to be “effective” while the presidency, the judiciary and parliament remain useless institution.

Akufo-Addo and some major figures in his government today are part of the original authors of the so-called “Third World Standards” in the Fourth Republic. He, therefore, needs to take partial responsibility for the mess we find ourselves in and take all necessary steps to turn things around.

At this point the moth-eaten constitution has overstayed its welcome and should be dispensed with. It is useless and must be considered beyond the pale. Ghana should avoid living with a dead constitution. This is why the country is dead as its soul, the national constitution, is lifeless!

FOOD FOR THOUGHT: SOME CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES

“The oppressive boot and the irrelevance of the colour of the foot that wears it” (Wole Soyinka).

And thus, Akufo-Addo should continue from where God left off, which is that he must concentrate on fashioning the totality of the Ghanaian body politic into a helpful mold of unbroken development wholeness, although Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Attah’s first budget statement is already running away from some of the NPP’s major electioneering responsibilities and promises.

And the sycophant Ghanaian public is happy, and deeply in love, with this “Matriki Wo Budget.” Here:

The twenty-five million factories…

One man, one wife…

One lie, one truth…

One China Policy…

One man, one free condom…

One man, one free million dollars…

Free Senior High School under trees…

One woman, one free condom…

One Quran, one Bible…

One man, one God…

One Yen Akanfuo, one All-Die-Be-Die…

One house, one road…

One armed robber, one political thief and criminal…

One social democracy, one property-owning democracy…

One Adam Smith, one Karl Marx…

One Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia, one Senior Minister Yaw Osafo-Marfo…

One Lilliputian Akufo-Addo, one Brobdingnagian John Mahama…

One open-defecation democracy makes Ghana the seventh dirtiest country in the one, one open-defecation democracy also makes Ghana the sixth fake drug producer in the world…

One NDC-NPP John Mahama out, one NDC-NPP Akufo-Addo in…

One Production Sharing Agreement out, one Ghana Hybrid System in…

One A-Plus, one Mzbel…

One Bishop Obinim, one Pastor Mensah Otabil…

One form of arrested development in, one form of arrested development out…

Vicious cycle of political stupidity reigns supreme!

CONCLUDING REMARKS

Mr. Akufo-Addo, get rid of your political mask then get to work, putting an immediate stop to your platitudinous political campaign.

Mr. Akufo-Addo, tell your Invincible Forces to stop chasing after public toilets and used, or secondhand, open-defecation vehicles.

Rather, tell your Invincible Forces to chase after the kinds of practical dreams that will bring back Production Sharing Agreement, the kinds of practical dreams that bring about true development and growth and usher in environmental consciousness and public hygiene, the kinds of practical dreams that improve the people’s standards of living and quality of life.

Mr. Akufo-Addo, get the engine of Production Sharing Agreement running, renegotiate all contracts and deals involving our mineral wealth, stop galamsey for good, reform the national constitution, all these before your term expires.

For you Mr. President, here:

No famine. No disease. No abuse of incumbency. No poverty. No illiteracy. No institutional corruption. No dumsor. No homelessness. No galamsey. No arrogance of power. No plagiarism…Amen!

No deserts. No more coercive power. No cemeteries. No more school children dying in deathtraps called “classroom.” No unemployment….Amen!

No more rhetorical indiscretions from Akufo-Addo, Naaba Abdulai, Kennedy Agyapong, the Invincible Forces, Montie 3…Amen!

No more Ghanaian men sticking their dirty toes in the vaginas of suspected thieves…Amen!

No devils in the details….Amen!

Only angels in the stale sandwich, the angels who came down from heaven to vote for Akufo-Addo en masse.

Ask the charlatan with the bleached face, Rev. Owusu Bempah, the man who knows how best to sing Kofi Sammy’s or Rex Lawson’s “Yellow Sissi”! If Rev. Owusu Bempah is lying then ask Angel Obinim!

What a humungous ball and stinking joke we call a country! This is stinking carcass is ranked the seventh dirtiest country in the world, and the same stinking carcass has also been ranked the sixth fake drug producer in the world.

These fake drugs are what our politicians administer to themselves when they are sick and even when they are not sick, hence their unfunctional and nonfunctioning mental faculties and political buffoonery.

Death to that staying power of a stinking carcass, a stinking carcass whose opportunistic carnivore bald-eagle leadership will rather sponsor the hajj of Muslims to Mecca, and Christians to the so-called Holy Land of Israel, than provide efficient public services to the teeming generality of their hardworking citizens!

Where are Bob Marley’s “Crazy Baldhead” and Fela Kuti’s “Coffin for Head of State”?

Until then, watch out for Akufo-Addo’s post-truth politics and deep state as the taproots of his Invincible Forces spread a climate of fear throughout the graveyard of Ghana’s open-defecation democracy.

We shall definitely return…