Features and Opinions

I have and drive a Ford Escape. It has served me well and after almost nine years, I think I can safely say that it qualifies to be called an old faithful. It has not left me stranded anywhere before and it has proved quite reliable when I have had to cope with flooding in Accra.

Who said elections are not good for this part of the world?  For me, the use of the ballot box and its paper is the best thing to happen to this country since independence from colonial rule in March 1957. With the 2016 presidential and parliamentary elections in the air, communities, which have never sniffed basic amenities, are suddenly being inundated with all manner of construction projects.

The Supreme Court has spoken again on the Abu Ramadan and Evans Nimako case, and once more there are several interpretations being given to it. Politics really does something to us, you know.

President when on his working visits across the country receives goats, sheep and smocks as gifts so accepting a car from a contractor is no big deal” – George Loh, MP for North Dayi.

Chief Executive Officer of Vodafone Ghana, Yolanda Zoleka Cuba, speaking in an interaction with the press the past weeks in Accra said as much as the company would like to introduce the Fourth Generation (4G) network, it is incapable of doing so now due to some  market dynamics, such as   their financial position and low 4G handset penetration.

“Any human being in the world would have encountered corruption one way or the other, either being offered a bribe or a bribe being demanded from you. What you need to do is to put yourself in a position to (resist it).”

For time immemorial, this society has been promoted more on the hyperbole than what actually would make the Ghanaian able to eke out a living. In those days when ‘work and happiness’ was sang on the factory floor, ostensibly to motivate the work-force to help industrialise this nation, workers were pretending to work and virtually oversaw various state enterprises collapse by the time the motivating theme had ran full circle. Of course, the state, being the largest employer, was also pretending to pay workers. Pittances in wages on offer could take no worker home.

 Mr. President, how would you assess your communication skills? I vividly remember how Mr. President, you subtly ran away from this similar question posed to you in one of your annual meet the press encounters at the Flagstaff House. Flippantly, Mr. President you said you are not a teacher and you are not good at marking, and that answer brought some dead silence at the venue because some of your critics were anticipating for yes or no answer. And you indeed crept from the trap.

I never thought I will have to express my disgust in a familiar tone like the above title again. The first time I used it, the rendition was, ‘This is the mother of all stupidity’. It is a caption I gave to an article written about four years ago to capture my sentiments at that time. In the piece, I lamented over the economic consequences of increasing the number of parliamentary seats and district councils when the country’s economy was in dire straits.

Once upon a time a rider came across a few soldiers who were trying to move a heavy log of wood without success. A corporal was standing by just watching as the men struggled. The rider couldn?t believe it. He finally asked the corporal why he wasn?t helping. The corporal replied: ?I am the corporal. I give orders.?

My generation had a lot to be happy about as children. Even though we did not have the T.Vs, and the many things of interest and education for the children of today, we were still happy in our own rights. Setting aside the movies I watched at the Prempeh Cinema Hall and occasionally the Princess Cinema, all defunct in the then bustling city of Takoradi, we still had fun in the Kweku Ananse stories told us by the elderly. Some of today believe that the Kweku Ananse stories did not teach good lessons because the main character was always doing something wrong. Indeed he never did anything right.

I won’t be voting for John Mahama, the current President and still candidate of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) in November.

The three Abrahamic faiths; Judaism, Christianity and Islam have been able to withstand the test of time because adherents of the three faiths have never doubted their origin. They all believe they are descendants of the Patriarch, Abraham who the Almighty God referred to as His friend.  Names like Jesus, Moses, Hagar, Solomon, David, Ishmael, Isaac, Noah, Jacob, Mary, Joseph, Zachariah and many more are found in the Holy Books of these three Abrahamic faiths but the difference is that they are spelt and pronounced differently. The roles they played in the three Holy Books are the same.

The military, as a security apparatus, has refrained from issues bordering on the media, since the return to Constitutional rule in January 1993, I can affirm. One of the casualties of the so-called revolution when Jerry John Rawlings, aided by those who claim to believe in him, sat at the Castle and visited mayhem on this nation, in the name of a revolution, was the media.

On Tuesday, May 3, 2017, the New Patriotic Party (NPP) held a press conference in Accra, and warned of a chaotic state in this country, if the security services failed to curb their tendency to favour the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) against other players in the national election psyche. 

SMARTTYS SWEETHEART DEAL - Between the Ministry and the PPA

On 28th July 2015, some two months AFTER Smarttys had completed the branding of the buses, the Chief Director of the Ministry for Transport, signing on behalf of the Minister, then wrote to the Public Procurement Agency (PPA) for approval to sole-source the branding contract to Smarttys. The Ministry gave four reasons for giving this contract to Smarttys alone, and not opening it up for competitive bidding. Those reasons, of course, did not include the fact that Smarttys had already concluded the branding, and for that reason, there was no way any other person could be given the contract to do what Smarttys had already done under the sweetheart deal. We will examine each of these 4 reasons in turn, for the people to determine whether this was right or wrong.

I was torn between discussing the May 9 tragedy and the Supreme Court ruling on the unsuitability of the current Voters’ Register due to the existence of unqualified persons on the electoral roll. I opted for the former because today marks the 15th anniversary of what became the worst stadium disaster to have ever taken place in Africa. What a tragedy that was!

Preamble

In 1995, Ied NPP/CPP task force that took part in the first voters registration exercise of the 4th Republic. 21 years on, it’s unreal that the issue of foreigners is still at the centre of so much rancour.

 

If we thought that setting the dates for the registration exercise was the end of our woes, we misfired badly. For it appears that pushing things into the month of October, the end of which coincides with the celebration of  'Halloween',  is introducing a whole new dimension into the small business of empowering Ghanaians to decide who should take this country into the 21st century. As so often happens to the inhabitants of this haven of peace and tranquility, we can turn the most mundane and obvious things into very complex hypotheses.  So it is that instead of us concentrating our energies to get all Ghanaians to register to vote, everybody has become obsessed with ferreting out non-Ghanaians, who for reasons that still baffle me, we call 'Aliens', and not 'foreigners'.

All manner of people who have nothing to do with the voter registration exercise are making pronouncements on the subject. Almost invariably, most of the comments only add to the confusion rather than assist the Electoral Commission's work . The President has pronounced on the matter and conferred with delegations of chiefs who have ‘gone’ to him for counselling. Some chiefs who feel they are not confused have also pronounced on the subject. Political party activists have had their say, as have all manner of 'do-gooding' publicly-funded organizations who have only realized that they are to inform the citizenry of their rights and civic responsibilities. Even political rags are disguising mischief in the glove of news worthy civic duties.   Rather than clear the matter, most of the interventions have only managed to confuse the whole business even more.

The right to register to vote is enshrined in Article 42 of our Constitution which states:"Every citizen of Ghana of eighteen years of age or above and of sound mind has the right to vote and is entitled to be registered as a voter for the purposes of public elections and referenda” The key qualifications are citizenship, age and soundness of mind. The fun and games begin when people try to define what qualifies one to be a Ghanaian and how do we verify this fact. The Constitution gives very clear and unambiguous definitions of citizenship.

Articles 6 & 7 of the Constitution define who can call themselves a Ghanaian citizen. The easiest and most incontrovertible cases are that anyone who was a citizen when the Constitution came into force on 7 January 93 continues to be a citizen (Art. 6(1). For the purposes of the forthcoming registration exercise, the other important class to note is anybody over the age of 18 and of sound mind who has taken the necessary steps to acquire Ghanaian citizenship by registration since 7 January 1993, according to the requirements of Art. 7.  However, the problem comes up when it comes to verification.  For in the absence of proper documentary evidence such as a national identity card, it is well nigh impossible to resolve the matter of who is or is not a 'foreigner' living in Ghana.

Let's start from the first principle. I had always assumed that anybody who is born in Ghana automatically qualifies to be a citizen of Ghana. But it turns out that this is not the case at all. If they were not already recognised as citizens when this constitution came into force, they can become so if either of their parents or grandparents were citizens of Ghana. Now this is where the real problems begin when dealing with who is an alien in our midst and must, therefore, mind his own business when it comes to registering to vote.

There are several people born outside of the borders that define the modern state of Ghana who have lived here for many years and some even decades.  If they have gone through a formal process of taking up citizenship of Ghana, then they are citizens of Ghana and are entitled to register to vote. But what of their children who may have been born in Ghana and are over the age of 18? In the absence of birth conferring an automatic right of citizenship, I am not so sure that they are covered by Art. 42 unless they themselves have gone through a formal process of naturalization. The reality is that most people in this category are largely illiterate, often live in rural areas  and hardly have a need to travel outside our  borders and thus obtain a passport, the most formal and definitive recognition of citizenship in the absence of a national ID card.

The confusion about establishing the right to register of so called aliens is compounded by the absence of any requirement to provide proof of citizenship and age. Again, we have sought shelter in the increasingly absurd excuse that we do not keep proper records of births and deaths. So it is that anybody can turn up, claim to be a Ghanaian, of 18 years or above, and of sound mind, and demand to be registered to vote as of right.  The onus is then on the party agents to challenge their claim of qualification and eligibility.

The farce begins when both the prospective voter and the challenger(s) have different interpretations of citizenship and there is no incontrovertible evidence available to settle the dispute.  The present regulation says that the person should be allowed to register under formal protest, with verification to be decided at a future date. So he or she will be entitled to try to register. However, the challenger may also be very determined to stop them on the basis that once they register, nothing can undo. Both sides may be asserting rights which are probably not well-informed by the laws of the land or the regulations governing the registration exercise.

For the moment, let's try to bring sanity into the whole process by suggesting that: 1) anyone who knows they were not born in Ghana and have not taken the necessary steps to take up Ghanaian citizenship should not attempt to register:;2)Anybody born in Ghana must be assumed to be a citizen unless they have taken legal steps to renounce their citizenship; 3)Anybody who is in doubt about their eligibility or feels they are likely to be challenged must try to take some documentary evidence of eligibility with them to their registration centre; 4) Political party agents must accept and operate by the Electoral Commission's rule that anybody suspected of being an alien must be allowed to register whilst a formal protest is launched and the matter investigated. 

The registration of voters is too important an exercise for this country's future for it to be allowed to degenerate into a squabble about terrestrial aliens living in our midst. In this regard, nobody should ever appear to be offering advice that people who are clearly foreigners in our midst can and should be allowed to register, on account of some spurious sentiment of oneness of people divided by colonially-created boundaries. For the moment, these boundaries the legitimate definition of the nation state of Ghana, which give credence and authority for the same person to call themselves the elected President.

Ultimately, the lesson for us to learn is our refusal to do proper documentation of who is or is not a Ghanaian will always catch up with us in unexpected but inevitable dire consequences.  The case for a national ID card becomes more and more compelling each day, photo, thumb print and all. . If we had them, all we would have had to do would have been to turn up at the registration centres, flash them at the electoral officers and bingo they will become empowered for Decision '96.  

Let me own up first. I voted and campaigned vigourously for Paul Afoko, particularly Western Regional votes in 2014 before we went to Tamale. He won and I was happy. I believed and trusted him to be sincere towards the course of the NPP even if Nana Akufo Addo did not like him, as he has made the world to believe. Obviously, he also did not like Nana Akufo Addo but all of them like the NPP. In my view, their collective love and attachment to the party and what it stands for would have watered down whatever animosity; real or perceived that existed between them. Nay, it did not happen, the unexpected happened, Paul Afoko has exercised his constitutional right to challenge his suspension in court.

Because it is confident that the voters will be more swayed by their own living conditions to vote against President Mahama than anything else, having exhausted its arsenal of promise-making and being left with nothing else but loud-mouthed criticisms, “takashi”, and “patapaa”(intimidation). But is that enough to win it Election 2016? Folks, in assessing the electioneering campaign strategies of the political parties toward Election 2016, it is clear that even though we are not yet in the main season, a lot is happening to tell us how the tide flows.

After the 2012 elections, I hosted a special four-part series of my Tarzan’s Take television show under the theme “Beyond the Verdict”. The 2nd programme, titled “Never Again: Electoral Reforms & Constitutional Changes’, focused on the necessary reforms and legal changes that were needed to ensure that the outcome of future elections, especially the inauguration of the incoming President, would only occur after all the due processes involving any legal challenges had been decided.

I have heard ugly noises from very knowledgeable people, seeking to justify the change of logo by the Electoral Commission without any official consulting stake-holders and the people of Ghana, in whose name the commission operates, and whose taxes oil the life-styles of the Commissioner and all their men and women.

My sudden addiction to social media lately is really taking its toll on many other hobbies I use to enjoy. I hardly make time to read articles from my favourite journals and motivational books since Facebook seems to be providing me real time articles both good and bad ones.

How much do you know about the President’s cabinet? What about his non-cabinet members? You should find out who they’re and what they stand for because they get the president’s ear.

For all my life, I’ve attended two political rallies, both in 1992, when I didn’t have a vote. The first one was an NDC rally at the Techiman Methodist School park. When I heard that President Rawlings was coming to town, I made it to the rally grounds sharpish, taking a position as close to the dais as possible to see President Rawlings 'fiili-fiili.' Sadly, President Rawlings' spoke in an inappropriate manner that even his interpreter, the late I. K. Adjei-Mensah, tried to polish things up. But Rawlings would have none of that, insisting that the interpreter should say exactly what he had said. When the interpreter persisted with his 'polishing-up' interpretation, Rawlings pushed him aside and asked someone else to do the interpretation.

The President of Ghana, His Excellency John Dramani Mahama has embarked on a nationwide tour, ostensibly to account for his stewardship of the last four years and to ask for a fresh mandate on November 7, 2011. The account has consisted largely of inauguration of infrastructure projects ie roads, schools, hospitals, as well as cutting sods for the start of new projects, albeit more infrastructure.

As the November 7 2016 general elections in Ghana draw closer, the political and power out-come dynamics are getting clearer. The two main players in this year’s Presidential contest without a doubt remain the same as in the last election.

Barely eight hours after hearing the bodyguard of a presidential contender had been detained along with a photographer, I read this online story of a 15-year-old thrown into a police cell overnight for tearing up another presidential contender’s poster. Security matters are about everyone because everyone needs security. So I tread carefully in my ‘intrusion’ into those matters.

The New Patriotic Party (NPP) led by their so-called Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo have been loading it on President John Mahama that he is an incompetent leader who does not deserve a second-term, therefore Ghanaians should try him. Should Ghanaians try Akufo-Addo? Ha-ha! A competent person is known to have the necessary ability, knowledge, or skill to do something successfully.

I have restrained myself from being one of the critics of the President’s choice of Madam Charlotte Osei as the Chairperson of the Electoral Commission.

My reason is simple. I do not want to swim in the same river with those who believe that it was inappropriate for a woman to be handed that task. I am forward-thinking and so I am convinced that competence, integrity, knowledge, and even courage, cuts across gender.

And so if I would have critiqued a man’s performance in charge of this sensitive institution, then I will certainly not hesitate to do same when a woman is in charge.

‘Giving a dog a bad name’

But I also want to believe that some chauvinists may be unduly exerting pressure on Ghana’s first female head of the EC. It’s perhaps just a case of giving the dog a bad name to hang it.

Without going on that trajectory nonetheless, it must be candidly stated that, some of the events that have characterized Charlotte Osei’s 10-months reign are disquieting.

And some of these events have genuinely made me question her leadership credentials and what the rippling effects of her actions or inaction could be for this nation, bearing in mind the delicacy of the institution she heads.

What is my grumble about Charlotte Osei?

One of the first hurdles she is even yet to cross is the most critical issue of a credible register for the first major election she would be overseeing come November 7, 2016.

Without going into the technicalities or the merits of the proposal for a new voters’ register, advocates for the new electoral roll have put forward their arguments be they valid or not.

Those opposed to it have equally done same; and attempts have been made by the EC to respond to the issues and address them.

A supposed neutral committee has recommended cleaning of the register rather than a compilation of a new one.

Convincing assurance

Regardless of this, the cacophony of noises over the register still remains. I believe that at this point, all that the commission must do; is to give a convincing assurance that there is no cause for alarm and that the elections would be credible with or without a new register – which she has tried, but not convincing enough.

‘Laughable’ logo

I find it quite inconceivable however, that just when the huge dust over the register debate is yet to settle, and after the brouhaha that equally greeted the Commission’s botched National Election Steering Committee, a rather bizarre decision could be taken to change the EC’s logo.

And this is at a time when the Commission’s education drive on the electioneering process has not effectively started with barely seven months to the election.

Of what positive impact will the logo of a national institution such as the EC, which is not a service provider in competition with any entity, have on the crucial event of November 7, 2016?

I am not for or against a new register; I am only for a credible register. But is a new logo more important than a credible or a new register? What are the priorities of the commission considering the huge financial burden that comes with organising elections? I believe every little penny must be spent on organising a free, fair and transparent election; and the introduction of a new logo, certainly is unconnected to achieving this, and must be condemned by every right-thinking Ghanaian.

Debate on logo needless

The President, John Dramani Mahama, a major stakeholder in the contest of November 7, has suggested that the debate over the logo brouhaha is putting undue pressure on the commission.

These were his words “Some parties have made it a penchant to continuously attack the Electoral Commission for reasons I can’t understand. This is the time to give the EC peace to do its work …I mean how is a logo going to affect the quality of elections in this country? I don’t think it’s a discourse that we should be splitting heads on. I think that our Electoral process has inherent safeguards in it that any serious political party can ensure that it polices that election and ensure the integrity of the election.”

Mr. President, you got it wrong on this one. Let us be truthful for once regardless of where we stand on the political divide. Let’s stop this hypocrisy else this nation will keep marking time.

Mr. President, I am sure that until the recent logo brouhaha, you may not have even taken notice of what the EC has been using as a logo all these years. You can be pardoned for that because I am in the same boat with you on that just as many Ghanaians are.

And we can all be pardoned if we didn’t know about the EC’s logo because in the scheme of things, it is of no use to us. If we have anything to be concerned about as far as the EC is concerned, it is the results of their work. It is the integrity, fairness and transparency in what they do. Therefore, if there must be any re-branding, it should be towards changing the misconceptions about the commission; and a logo change cannot surely achieve that.

Perhaps, changing a logo at a time when there’s less activity for the commission, would not have elicited such public outrage. It would have gone unnoticed. Like the Akan adage says, ‘We do what is essential, before what is praiseworthy’. And like the good Book says in Corinthians, “All things are lawful, but not all things are profitable”.

I hope this is not one of the usual attempts for someone to benefit unfairly from the state coffers through the award of the contract for this shambolic logo. We are very much aware that in mother Ghana, the over bloating of project costs for the sake of kickbacks is very normal and no more shocking.

Madam Charlotte Osei, I get the feeling that you want to leave in your stead symbols that you would be remembered for when your service is over. Well; leaving behind a new logo just as it was listed as one of your achievements when you were in charge of the National Commission for Civic Education (NCCE), will only be laughable and mediocre.

And perhaps in your haste to impress us with a new logo, you ended up giving us one that has many potholes. There are even allegations of copying, which is even much more embarrassing if they are indeed true. I hope you can exhibit the audacity to withdraw or postpone it and rather focus on the major issues. But I won’t be surprised if you don’t because in this society, we are conversant with mediocrity because there is very little or no integrity.

For the office that you hold, your legacy will not be a mere symbol; but rather an intangible legacy of peace and stability for our country as you lead the Commission to conduct the make or break exercise for the country. That is what your predecessor Dr. Kwadwo Afari Gyan left behind despite the up and downs that characterized his 22-years of committed service.

We cannot begrudge him because like the African proverb says ‘He who fetches water indeed breaks the pot’.

Your position as the Chairperson of the EC, may undisputedly be one of the most sensitive positions, and so you must constantly remind yourself of the task handed to you, and also know that every action you take will be tracked by the public eye; you must thus have a listening ear, and make sense of good counsel and objective criticism.

Inasmuch as I had some reservations about the man Afari-Gyan, I wish to say that, I am proud of him and would have been gratified if I had come through his loins.

My admiration of him from afar; is rooted in the bravery that he exhibited in his over two decades of dedicated service to this country.

Yes; it may be an undeniable fact; that in being firm, which is for me the most important but unmentioned requisite in heading an institution such as the Electoral Commission, he may have sometimes gone overboard – for which reason his critics have touted him as stubborn or intransigent.

This may not be weird or untrue about Dr. Afari-Gyan because although I am not an expert in human behaviour; it is rational that anyone who exhibits firmness in their deeds, may sometimes go overboard by ignoring what is right and sticking only to their own positions.

In some cases also; such persons are wrongly misjudged or hated for their firmness; so, the criticisms may be bias.

We hope that you don’t become hardened to wise counsel and dispassionate criticism; and we also hope that you don’t become a weakling or a walkover for the selfish interests of some individuals or groups.

My mouth has fallen; the young can be as wise as the grey-haired.