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Opinions of Sunday, 6 March 2016

Columnist: Boateng, Emmanuel Agyemfra

Richard Ellimah is a ghanaian not a Chinese!

By Emmanuel Agyemfra Boateng

Mr. Richard Ellimah is a royal blooded native of Kikam, a very beautiful town in the Western Region of Ghana.

He is the Executive Director for Center for Social Impact Studies (Cesis) a civil society group headquartered in Obuasi . His organization which has dedicated all its resources into capacity building of the vulnerable, dealing with human rights issues, fighting for residents affected by mining and many other sacrificial duties.

His organization was the only civil society group that was able to come out and explain where the 3.6 billion Smarty’s bus branding deal money was taken from. One of the most hearts piercing broad day light state robbery!
This short write up of mine is not to eulogize the man whose name I have in my title, but to let my dear readers know he is a Ghanaian not a Chinese so have al the moral right to comment on the governance of the state.
Our dear country has been torn into two by blind partisan politics, which have given some of the young men and women the audacity to write or say anything uncivilized to anyone who comments or write something on the sitting government’s policies.
The table turns when a respected Ghanaian comments on the policies of the biggest opposition party, New Patriotic Party (NPP)
Mr. Richard Ellimah, the Kikam royal blooded Ghanaian yesterday was taken to the laundry for doing analysis on whether the President’s promise to build the people of New Edubiase a stadium was feasible or not.
Young communicators of the Obuasi West wing of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) asked him to shut up and called his analysis ‘myopiac intellectual dishonesty’
Some members of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) took him to the cleaners when he said John Dumelo had a right to choose who he thinks should be the leader for the country.
Pastor Mensah Otabil and other elderly statesmen have all being tagged anti-government because of their stance on some government policies.
Other statesmen who questioned some policies of the NPP were also taken to the cleaners!
What kinds of Country are we leaving in, where we should applaud the President on everything he does, then why do we say we are practicing democracy.
If the intellectuals of our country like Richard Ellimah; for the fear of being insulted, coil back into their shells and keep mute this country will sink to the bottomless pit.
If Richard Ellimah pays for his Electricity and water bills, feed people for free, pay school fees for poor students for free then what stops him from saying building of a stadium for the people New Edubiase is not the best of priorities?
Richard Ellimah is not a Chinese citizen who has no moral right to comment on our governance!
The high rate of poverty, high rate of Teenage Pregnancy, high rate of youth unemployment and other social crisis are what the DCE and MP should have told the President they needed interventions for; not a STADIUM which the National Sports Council can’t maintain and the people of New Edubiase don’t need now!
If you have a Member of Parliament like Mr. Yarkah who doesn’t even know what is best for his people then we are doomed!
Until we know our politicians are taken us for a ride, will be the day we will be sinking like Titanic.
The only thing these NDC youth and the executives in the Obuasi West Constituency can do to this selfless and committed citizen, is to try to intimidate him by insulting him on Social Media and on radio just as they do to other statesmen who point out loopholes in governments policies.
We can’t be quiet if all is not well with us.
This is not the first time Richard Ellimah is talking and won’t be the last.

Long live Richard Kojo Ellimah…Long live Obuasi…Long live Ghana