Advice to His Excellency the President and a Merry Christmas

At this time of every year, it is culturally normal to wish friends, loved ones, and family members still alive the festive Christmas greetings. Subsequently, I am using this publication to extend my heartfelt wish of a Merry Christmas and a Prosperous New Year to His Excellency Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, the President of the Republic of Ghana. In the same vein, may I wish him a healthy longevity and the blessings of God Almighty.

I beseech God to bestow upon him the spirit of discernment, the wisdom of King Solomon and the courage to govern the nation to the satisfaction of the citizens. By keeping faith with God to govern the nation according as he promised the citizens during his electioneering campaign, he will not only endear himself to the populace but also, bring glory unto God who saw him, appointed him out of many, and anointed him to come and liberate Ghanaians from most of their socio-economic woes.

May I plead with the President not to lose sight of his promises to the people and any secret promise he might have made to God following which he committed his battles to win an election to become the President of Ghana into the hands of God. Yes, the whole nation witnessed how he fervently entrusted himself, his aspirations and commitments into the mighty hands of God the Creator hence his campaign slogan of "The battle is the Lord’s".

As it does not belong to he who is leading to redirect their steps, and with man being fallible, there is the need for reminding our fellows of their promises from time to time and advising them to keep faith with the people. In spite of the saying, "a promise is a debt to pay but not the debt itself", I will encourage the President to try as best as he could not to be distracted from his promises and intentions. Some people may present themselves to him as the "morning star" (light-bearers) but are indeed the devil incarnates seeking his downfall.
Anyone who will advise you to deviate from your core promises in contravention with your exhaustively thought-out plans is surely your enemy in disguise. There is no way that all your campaign promises can be achieved or implemented in your first term, or possibly, two terms in office. The promises as I keep saying, are to be viewed as a long term development plan by a visionary leader. However, the practical execution of the promises must be prioritised according to the national or the public’s scale of preference.

To be honest with the President, what endeared you most to the public was your promise to fight corruption; the militating factor against the socio-economic development of Ghana. However, not much has been seen of you to realising this particular promise. Having procrastinated so much in achieving this much touted policy, despite forming the Office of the Special Prosecutor, corruption is still as it was if not ramifying in strength. The Office of the Special Prosecutor is derisorily becoming a white elephant. The police officers are still openly on the roads collecting bribes from motorists. Court clerks and registrars are still taking bribes and hiding or removing vital documents from dockets to twist justice in favour of who bribes them. Land guards are still operating with newfound bravado. The fear people had for you as a "no nonsense anti-corruption man or President" has just evaporated into the thin air in no time of your assumption of power. This is all down to some dithering on your part. Is there not a saying that goes, "strike when the iron is hot"?

If anyone has advised you saying, "governance is not about rushing to apply force or harsh policies to curb the tormenting ills in the society but to go about things slowly or softly", I am afraid that person, if you have heeded their advice, is the one who has weakened you. Again, there is a rumour that someone has advised you not to arrest any official who might have resorted to corruption to enrich themselves or their friends and family. If this allegation is true and you have heeded that person’s advice, I am afraid you have missed your promissory policy target on fighting to eradicate corruption from Ghana.

I have messages forwarded to my WhatsApp page in which three prominent world leaders have had a genuine cause to slander Africans. It is all because of our infatuation with corruption that has deprived the African nations of the needed funds for the development of our nations. The politicians and the Civil Service heads in whom we entrust our welfare and the management of the affairs of the nation for the collective interest of all, rather end up misappropriating funds and State assets. Russian President Vladimir Putin says, African leaders have turned their countries into cemeteries. Who will ever develop a cemetery, he queries. According to him, our politicians steal the money; stash them away in foreign banks, seek medical attention abroad and educate their children abroad. However, they desire their dead remains to be freighted to Ghana or Africa for burial. American President Donald Trump calls African countries shitholes all because of our fondness for corruption that has deprived the nations of resources to develop Africa. North Korean President Kim Jong-un is asking Ghana and Nigeria to give in for recolonizing by the whites or to allow him one year to rule both countries to transform them into world class sought-after countries. He cannot understand why with all our abundant resources we are still poor. For him, it is due to our leaders stealing everything for their personal use while majority of the people and the nations linger on in deprivation.

From the above, Your Excellency the President, you have the obligation to fight corruption in Ghana without any ifs or buts. Should anyone advise you to just mind governing the country without arresting any corrupt official, please take it from me that whoever tells you that is your worst enemy seeking your disgrace and downfall.
Does the bible not say in Matthew 6:33, "Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you"? Subsequently, fight the corruption effectively and money for implementing your other laudable policies will be available to you in abundance without any further need for going abroad to borrow money or beg for alms to develop your country.


Hopefully, there will be no more excuses for why the Special Prosecutor has not yet started prosecuting past corrupt government officials. I hope no one will frustrate him from doing his job. Ghanaians can no longer cope with the corruption masterminded and orchestrated by the very leaders from whom we otherwise expect better.

My senior brother, Kyei Boateng, in Canada, continually keeps saying, "You should never say my plans have failed. Plans never fail when things don’t go your way as expected. It is because you rather failed to plan properly. If you plan well and stick to your plan, all shall be well" Therefore, Mr President, please stick to your plan of dealing drastically with the deemed corrupt officials without allowing any chief or person to dissuade you from your intents.

Finally, please remember the sermon at the church service in Tottenham in London in somewhere 2013. The pastor said, if I do recollect vividly well, "We always hear four voices all of the time when faced with a problem". They are the voice of the public, the voice of your friends, the voice of your enemies, and your own voice. He admonished that you should always listen to your inner voice which is the voice of God. Your inner voice has since day one been telling you to robustly fight to eliminate the cancerous corruption from the Ghanaian society hence your fulfilled promise of creating the Office of the Special Prosecutor. However, two years into your administration, how successfully have you fought corruption? Be a judge unto yourself on the posed question.

Once again, I say, a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to you and your wife and children. How I hope your New Year resolution becomes an invigorated desire to fight corruption by listening to your inner voice without yielding in to anyone’s advice to you to go softly on corrupt government and civil service officials.