By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

It is rather pathetic, even as Mr. P. C. Appiah-Ofori, the retired New Patriotic Party Member of Parliament (NPP-MP), has aptly suggested, that Dr. Charles Wereko-Brobbey had been present when the decision of the NPP National Executive Committee to petition the Supreme Court vis-a-vis the declaration of Mr. John D. Mahama as winner of Election 2012 by Dr. Kwadwo Afari-Gyan was taken and had been fully in agreement with the same, at least he had not impugned the same at the time, only to later emerge out of the proverbial woodwork to rather ignobly impeach the soundness of the same.

In sum, it is rather weird, to say the least, for the former Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Volta River Authority (VRA) to virulently accuse NPP parliamentarians of indulging in the "Theater of the Absurd," merely because the latter, having flatly refused to participate in the vetting of cabinet appointees nominated by President Mahama would, nevertheless, insist on participating in the fielding of questions by the same cabinet appointees on the floor of the House (See "NPP is Struggling to Remain Consistent - Tarzan" Radioxyzonline.com/Ghanaweb.com 2/26/13).

Clearly, the theatrically absurd aspect of this whole bizarre parliamentary charade, is the curious refusal of people like Dr. Wereko-Brobbey to appreciate the quite basic fact that it takes two to tango. In other words, it cannot be gainsaid that the present stultifying parliamentary state of affairs, or crisis, was equally contributed to by the country's two major political parties, namely, the ruling National Democratic Congress and the main opposition New Patriotic Party. Under these circumstances, the two parties ought to be equally held accountable for the current climate of stalemate in which at best only a piddling little of the duties of the House appears to be capable of being realized.

What is clearly involved here has far less to do with the personal ethic, or morality, of individual NPP Members of Parliament than the imperative need for the Ghanaian electorate to be legally able to morally justify or redeem their ballot. I would be very surprised, indeed, if Dr. Wereko-Brobbey expressed publicly that in the cockles of his heart, as it were, going into the executive meeting at which the decision by the NPP was taken to contest the political legitimacy of President Mahama, he had not in any way, shape or form, whatsoever, felt that the presidential candidate of the New Patriotic Party, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, had not been literally taken to the cleaners by Dr. Kwadwo Afari-Gyan in a way and manner that could not be soundly said for the epic trouncing of Mr. Victor Owusu, of the defunct Popular Front Party (PFP), by the Limann-led People's National Party (PNP) in 1979.

If he had not, then there can absolutely be no gainsaying that "Tarzan" is the poorest excuse of a major Ghanaian politician to have emerged since Prime Minister Kwame Nkrumah's declaration of Ghana's reassertion of sovereignty from British colonial domination in 1957. If, on the other hand, he had, indeed, gone into the executive session of the NPP thinking in the likeness of Mr. Appiah-Ofori and Nana Akufo-Addo, then, really, it is Dr. Wereko-Brobbey who deserves to be dubbed as a veritable protagonist of his own so-called Theater of the Absurd. I know what I am talking about because I was raised by a father who deeply appreciated the intricate dynamics of Ghanaian theater with a depth that Mr. Owusu's nephew could only grow to appreciate in at least three lifetimes!

I can at least sympathize with President Mahama and some of the more levelheaded operatives of the NDC in their despondency over the resolute refusal of the NPP-MPs to play by their book, as it were, in principle; but it ought to be unreservedly understood that this is the last time that any key operatives of the NDC would ever presume to play fast-and-loose with the sacred Constitution of Ghana's Fourth Republic and not expect there to be any dire consequences in return. And it is for the latter reason that Nana Akufo-Addo would likely go down the annals of Ghanaian statesmen and women in a way that cynics and pathological sourpusses like Dr. Wereko-Brobbey can only imagine or, at best, only faintly dream about.

We also find it to be of imperative necessity to warn Mr. Yaw Boateng-Gyan, the NDC's equivalent of a Qaeda operative, that having a parliamentary majority does not make the ruling party proprietors of the Republic of Ghana; and that as a matter of paramount national security interest, any legitimately elected member of Ghana's parliament reserves the right, within the bounds of parliamentary protocol, of course, to demand of cabinet appointees the uses to which our national resources are being periodically put and, indeed, the general direction in which our proverbial ship-of-state is being steered.

Needless to say, at the end of the day, the definitive decision of whether the raging parliamentary Theater of the Absurd gets resolved in a timely manner, the way NPP Quislings and Benedict Arnolds like "Tarzan" would have it, pretty much depends on the calendar load, or burden, of the Wood court as well as the level of priority accorded the same by the highest court of the land. Of course, I am also sensitive and patriotic enough to recognize the need for sanity in the way in which the Republic of Ghana is managed by the men and women elected by the people to do the same. Till then, though, let the proverbial band play on as it should and ought to. In sum, the New Patriotic Party can ill afford to throw our beloved country to the dogs and the wolves.

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*Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.
Department of English
Nassau Community College of SUNY
Garden City, New York
March 2, 2013
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