ANDREW LANG

“Politicians use statistics in the same way that a drunk uses lamp-posts—for support rather than illumination.”

We continue from Part 1:

Not even does Paa Kwesi Nduom see a formidable debater in Akufo-Addo.

In fact, Paa Kwesi Nduom knows Akufo-Addo is definitely going to be an easy target for President Mahama, hence his [Nduom’s] invitation to the latter for a debate in which he, rather than Akufo-Addo, engaged the president. A national debate between Nduom and the president will be an interesting one.

Ironically, also, the IEA and the Akufo-Addo brands have devalued so much so that Akua Donkor, founding leader of the Ghana Freedom, has had the temerity to come out with her own criticism for the IEA as well as serving notice of her intentions to debate Akufo-Addo. This is what she reportedly said recently:

“I am ready to debate Nana Akufo-Addo and I want the IEA to create the platform for Akufo-Addo and I.”

Yet again, the proposed debate between the president and Akufo-Addo may not yield or amount to much.

This is largely because of the possibility of the other presidential candidates demonstrating a superior intellect on and intimate grasp of wide-ranging matters of national policy, political economy and development economics, fiscal policy and international relations, or of stronger, better opinions on the current state of affairs than either President Mahama or Akufo-Addo.

It is however surprising that the national spotlight is on President Mahama and Akufo-Addo.

The other question is this:

What is the nature of the questions the IEA is going to ask those two, President Mahama and Akufo-Addo, which will not be asked of all the presidential candidates when they meet on a single platform?

Now if the NDC does not trust the IEA, why will it [the NDC] take part in this proposed national debate when there is a nagging possibility and suspicion that the IEA will likely share or leak debate topics and questions to the Akufo-Addo camp?

This rhetorical question is our considered opinion, though.

But, having said all that, President Mahama is still part of the larger problem of crisis situation the IEA presently finds itself in, as the president did not specifically mention which moderator-platform he had in mind when he threw out that challenge to his political rival.

In point of fact, the all-knowing leadership of the IEA which has been moderating the presidential debates in the Fourth Republic may have seen itself as a natural corollary, in terms of a moderator, of the president’s challenge to Akufo-Addo. And if we may also have to add, the president therefore cannot and should not be blamed for the assumptive assertiveness of the IEA.

We will, nonetheless, absolve the president of any blame because he did not ask the IEA to take on that responsibility of moderating a national debate between him and Akufo-Addo.

But we may have to add that the IEA’s newly-proposed national debate modalities being floated around, in which the only presidential candidates and political parties with political representation in parliament debate each other is not a commendable or progressive idea at all in our opinion, for those MPs are not doing any “useful” for the masses and the country anyway, let alone use that as an exclusive criterion for policy engagement among political parties in a proposed national debate.

And there is an additional or greater possibility that, the flagbearers of the non-establishment parties can outperform those of their establishment colleagues, an upstaged advantage which can earn those non-establishment parties new PMs, to replace those of the sitting establishment ones.

This is merely a working hypothesis.

In the final analysis, then, it is good that the IEA has finally come out to explain some of the erroneous interpretations and twists a number of citizens, depending on their political and ideological persuasions, have given its new modalities of debating proposals.

We cannot overstate this.

Still, ideas as to how this year’s national debate should go abound. Prof. Amoako Baah, for instance, suggests another set of debating modalities, controversial though: Mahama-Akufo-Addo, Mahama-Paa Kwesi Nduom.

And what of the other presidential candidates debating each other in pairs?

Yet he glosses over an Akufo-Addo-Paa Kwesi Nduom debating modality. Of course, Paa Kwesi Nduom will trounce Akufo-Addo.

We agree that problems of logistics, funding and time may not make these pairings possible. Our fundamental opinion is that fairness and equal representation should trump ideological biases.

Everything aside, we strongly suspect that Prof. Baah may have brought President Mahama, Paa Kwesi Nduom, and Akufo-Addo in paired permutations based on the numerical strengths of their electoral performances in the last general elections, otherwise we have no viable alternative working hypothesis to sufficiently explain or account for his strange modalities.

And this is the more reason why we have consistently asked all these non-establishment political parties to come together as a formidable third party.

Nonetheless Prof. Baah is not one academic to take serious.

Even so his statement to the effect that “Not all parties should be involved, but parties that are credible, those which have a good chance of doing well…” does not make sense.

Until the newly-proposed national debate is held, how exactly will we know which party has “a good chance of doing well”?

But the word “credible” in Prof Baah’s commentary seems to throw everything he has said—thus far on the new debating modalities—out of gear. It is not clear whether by “credible” he meant those parties whose flagbearers have a pretty good chance of doing well at the debate of at the polls?

The wording of his statements, afore-quoted, makes it clear that he was not taking about the previous national polls, 2012.

Rather he was taking about future elections, 2016.

Technically, the verb “have” in the truncated sentence “those which have a good chance of doing well” strongly speaks to the future.

A closer at the concluding segment of the afore-cited quote—“lest it becomes a distraction which prevents you from attaining the objective you set out to achieve”—may rather point to flagbearers’ performance at the polls.

What we are not clear about is who the “you” is in this sentence, whether it is the IEA or Prof. Baah’s peculiar mode of thinking, expectations, understanding, and interpretation of the IEA’s newly-proposed debating modalities against the backdrop of his conveniently arranged glosses and twists.

Still, Prof. Baah may as well have been referring to Hassan Ayariga’s episodic cough intrusiveness at the last presidential debate.

It has widely been alleged that Ayariga was and still is funded by President Mahama and the NDC, and was inserted into the national debate as a disruptive counterweight to Akufo-Addo.

The irony is that Ayariga’s episodic coughs were vexatious intrusions that needlessly affected all at the said debate, not least his wobbled conscience if indeed he were bribed by President Mahama and the NDC as has widely been alleged.

In fact this outrageous allegation persists to this day, as of this writing.

Now going back to one of our previous arguments, we may want to ask:

Who is Prof. Baah to say or determine which party is “credible” and which party is not “credible” in Ghana, anyway? More particularly, neither the NPP nor the NDC is “credible.”

Prof. Baah did not elaborate on these questions as far as our reading and understanding of his interview in the media are concerned.

Some of us would have wished neither party is returned to the Flagstaff House.

Having said that, we should all encourage these debates to take place as they have great potential to inform public opinion about governance.

This is not to imply that these debates will produce anything new that the public has not heard before. They will definitely be variations of policy clichés.

Perhaps the central idea behind such debates, in the first place, is that, members of the ruling elites and their friends give each other an opportunity to use any tool at each other’s disposal—be they lies, damned lies, statistics, half-truths, half-lies, outright bribery, charismatic authority, the power and conviction of public speaking—to “coerce” or “convince” the public to assist the ruling class to perpetuate its hold on power, often through the method of manufactured consent, playing the politics of mind games, and so on.

This constitutes the fundamental thrust of democratic practice, being that successfully manipulating public psychology to suit a certain ideological cast of the ruling class makes for a subdued electorate whose power of the elective franchise now becomes the property of the ruling class.

Yet the public oftentimes does not know that “half the truth is often a whole lie.” Now, we see how this charade of public “lovemaking” between the NCCE and the IEA is all a contest of lies.

Still, the public should go beyond the narrow platforms of the presidential and vice-presidential debates and thoroughly investigate every claim these candidates make.

Issues-based and competency politics should reduce themselves to this simple act of intimate electoral edification and education on the part of the electorate.

In other words the electorate should develop a proactive sense of detailed familiarization with the empirical facts of Ghana’s political economy.

The fairness, neutrality, and integrity of the IEA are at stake here.

This is why we wish selected questions for the debating candidates should be drawn from a computerized pool—if this is possible on a national scale—into which citizens from around the country pour their heartfelt expectations, fears, and reservations—a database from which IEA representatives randomly pick their questions, which should be done on the very days the said debates take place.

Unfortunately, the WAEC leakages demonstrate how sophisticated organized crime has become in Ghana and therefore there is no guarantee that what we have been suggesting will even work or succeed.

We want to make emphasize randomness, a means to curtail any insidious potential of a hint directed at particular candidates for reasons of clandestine advanced preparation prior to the debates.

We can then make sense of opinion, entrance and election exit polls come November 2016.

It is sad that Kofi Adams is now saying President Mahama and the NDC may not be taking part in the IEA-organized debate.

This is quite understandable.

The fact is that the NDC and those other parties which do not like the condescending postures of the IEA may consider the platform recently proposed by the National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE).

Issues of interpretation over who has constitutional mandate, credibility and institutional capacity to organize and moderate the debate further complicates and muddles the national discourse on what at all is fundamentally wrong with Ghanaians.

One (NCCE) is now talking about “presidential dialogue,” the other (IEA) about “presidential debate.” What does the concept “dialogue” exactly say about the concept “debate” —and vice versa? Are they the same? And will this “dialogue” or “debate” solve Ghana’s myriad problems? Necessarily not!

This convenient Orwellian language of deception—call it newspeak or doublespeak if you want—bespeaks the blatant politics of mind games which Ghanaian institutions and their political patrons have adopted purposely for manipulating and twisting political psychology to support their self-aggrandizing agenda of instinctive criminality, commissioning heinous crimes of political thievery, mediocrity, political ethnocentrism, technocratic buffoonery, political corruption, and sheer wasting of national resources!

And the public—the sleeping public—sits forlornly on the sidelines looking in…nonchalantly!

What are the NCCE and the IEA up to? Whose bidding are they doing? And for what purpose(s)?

Ayariga has already declared his intentions to boycott the IEA and its programs…

People’s National Convention’s Bernard Mornah says the IEA’s the Mahama-Akufo-Addo debate disrespects other political parties…

Haruna Iddrisu says the behavior of the IEA is “discriminatory” and “unconstitutional”…

The People’s Progressive Party (PPP) says the behavior of the IEA is “weakening democracy.”

Felix Kwakye-Fosu remarks: “I am appalled by the insufferable arrogance displayed by Jean Mensa and her IEA…”

The NPP says: “As we speak, we don’t have any proposal from the IEA before us and so we cannot say anything about it…”

Kofi Wayo, founder of United Renaissance Party (URP), reportedly said recently (our emphasis): “I will not advise the President to attend that debate, I have incredible information that IEA is scheming to disgrace him [the President]…The founder [Dr. Charles Mensah] of the ‘Azaa’ organization is a die in wool NPP and a ‘con man’…”

Of course we do not get it! Why are people like Wayo (“Chucks”) all getting it wrong?

But is it not also true that it was actually President Mahama who asked for this national debate with Akufo-Addo, although we accept the fact that the IEA may have gone about it the wrong way?

If yes, why are the NDC and its spokespersons now running from the deal? Could it be that it is because the IEA, an alleged “surrogate” of the NPP, is involved? Is it just that the president can no longer speak for himself?

Why is Kofi Adams now saying the NDC does not need “IEA to win election”? And why is Koku Anyidoho hounding and pushing Madam Hannah Tetteh to face the inquisitorial Sanhedrin of the NDC? Where are all these coming from?

So far, we have not heard anything from the president himself as regards what he makes of all these partisan and political hullabaloos?

Please Mr. President, make your authoritative stance on this divisive matter loud and clear so that the doubting Thomases in the public can put all the controversies and the acrimonies to eternal rest.

And oh, Ghana!

The deadly and poisonous virus of corruption seems to have permeated every fabric, every nook and cranny of Ghanaian society, from the state, government appointees, the private sector, political parties, religious institutions, civil society organizations, children and parents, grandmothers and grandfathers…to…

One wonders if Ghana and Ghanaians can actually live or survive without this corrosive oxygen of corruption…Oh, oh…Even the dead Ghanaian cannot live without this corrosive oxygen of corruption!

Let us happily and uncompromisingly chase these crazy-baldhead politicians out of town…And “corrupt” institutions like the IEA and…

REFERENCES

Ghanaweb. “Debate Me Not ‘Easy Match’ Nana Addo—Nduom to Mahama.” March 15, 2016.

Ghanaweb. “Ayariga To Lead Boycott Of IEA Programmes.” May 11, 2016.

Ghanaweb. “Mahama May Not Participate In IEA Debate.” May 11, 2016.

Ghanaweb. “Mahama-Akufo-Addo Debate Just Disrespectful To Parties—PNC.” May 11, 2016.

Ghanaweb. “Mahama-Akufo-Addo Debate Just A Proposal—IEA.” May 11, 2016.

Ghanaweb. “NCCE To Organize Presidential, Parliamentary Debates.” May 11, 2016.

Ghanaweb. “Poll Debates Must Be ‘Credible’ Parties—Baah.” May 11, 2016.

Ghanaweb. “We Don’t Need IEA Debate To Win Election—Kofi Adams.” May 11, 2016.

Ghanaweb. “Let’s Not Fight Over Debates—NCCE To IEA.” May 13, 2016.

Ghanaweb. “NPP Unhappy With IEA’s Announcement Of Debate.” May 12, 2016.

Ghanaweb. “IEA’s Actions Are Unconstitutional—Haruna Iddrisu.” May 15, 2016.

Ghanaweb. “Arrogance Displayed By Jean Mensa Appalling—Kwakye Fosu.” May 16, 2016.

Ghanaweb. “I Am Ready To Debate Akufo-Addo—Akua Donkor.” May 16, 2016.

Ghanaweb. “IEA Wants To Humiliate Mahama—Kofi Wayo.” May 18, 2016.

Ghanaweb. “Hannah Tetteh Not Bigger Than NDC—Anyidoho.” May 16, 2016.