It may be Anita de So-soo’s own ingenuous means of explaining away a very serious national problem. But the theory of seven dwarfs siphoning money from the Bank of Ghana and causing the cedi to fall, could only come from a mind not well tuned to serious affairs of state, making an uninformed statement about the serious business of state finances and igniting a national debate on the powers of dwarfs and the spiritual world.
The tragedy is not the pronouncement per se, which could only be explained away as comic relief. The national calamity lies in the fact that the leadership of this nation has contrived to find the mind of the National Women’s Organiser of the National Democratic Congress so critical to nation-building that the President of the Republic and his senior aides, have entrusted the art of co-ordinating national disaster in her hands.
By her appointment, the President and his aides have served notice to the general populace that next time disaster relief items run short, Ghanaians would all be prepared to accept an explanation grounded on the spiritual powers of seven dwarfs and their spiritual world.
As a supporter of Ebusua Dwarfs , I am unhappy with the flawed attempt to link this national economic disaster to the mysterious activities of dwarfs, even though De Soo-soo never had those group of mystery makers whose performance in Dakar at the week-end has left many admirers purring.
With the cedi still plummeting long after its spiritual release from bondage by a certain man of God, Ghanaians have no hiding place from the pangs of hunger and poverty threatening to take over the one-time Gold Coast.
School kids could well help out with the new conundrum. Which one of the two preceded the other-the theory of the seven dwarfs or the appointment of Anita de Soo-soo as Deputy National Co-ordinator of the National Disaster Management Organization?
Whaterver the answer, it could not mask the founder of the party’s assertion that President John Dramani Mahama is harbouring too many dead woods in the administration charting a course for ‘Better Ghana.’
On Thursday, a worried founder of the NDC granted an interview to Joy FM, and spoke in public about what many ordinary Ghanaians have been whispering in private.
According to Flt. Lt Rawlings, Ghanaians have reached their saturation point with what the ordinary man perceive as the incompetence or non-performance of the appointees of the Mahama Administration. “Of course, a sizeable number of them, I do not think, are good enough and they have demonstrated that with their time in office,” the former junta head who rode on the butt of the gun to establish the NDC as a political organization in 1992, told the radio station.
Read the lips of the former head of state: “I don’t think this is a matter of opinion really. I think we all see the result of their work. If they had performed better, things would have been different.”
Asking those linking him to problems in governance to get off his back, the former air force pilot directed those who have axe to grind about the governance process in the country, to direct their grievances to the appropriate quarters. “The elected President is the Coach, as he said and that is where our attention should be directed at.”
With the local currency dropping like ripe mangoes in a windy Harmattan season and triggering an amazing rise in the cost of goods and services which has also culminated in extreme hardship on Ghanaians, Flt Lt. Rawlings’ pronouncement was music in the ears of hard-up Ghanaians. On the air and the newspapers, the founder of the ruling party’s verdict on Mahama’s men and women was discussed to saturation point.
Rather than accepting the realities on the ground, or keep quiet on the conventional wisdom that the storm would come to pass, the Minister of Information, Mr. Mahama Ayiraga, rather poured oil on troubled waters.
The young Minister of Information, issued a statement describing Mr. Rawlings’ assertion as a trick to stampede the President into reshuffling his Cabinet. “President Mahama,” the Minister of Information wrote, “would not be tricked into a ministerial reshuffle.”
The statement said reports of ministerial reshuffle and possible list of those to be reshuffled “are merely designed to stay the hand of the President assuming he planned to undertake a reshuffle or to stampede His Excellency in carrying out a reshuffle,” the Ayariga, who will celebrate his 40th birthday, barely 10 days before Mr. Rawlings takes to the Revolutionary Square to light the flame for the 35th anniversary of his June 4 uprising.
The Minister of Information had just celebrated his fifth birthday, when then Capt. Boakye Djan led troops to release Flt. Lt. Rawlings from his cell at the then Special Branch headquarters in Accra, to announce the overthrow of the Supreme Military Council and the formation of the authoritarian Armed Forces Revolutionary Council on June 4, 1979.
In a statement that sought to mock the founder of the party, Mr. Ayariga stated: “If at anytime the President decides to reshuffle his Cabinet, his decision will never be influenced nor clouded by such reports but will be done through sound judgment – and a careful consideration of the resources at his disposal,” stated Mr. Ayariga, who was 18 years when Jerry Rawlings founded the party that propelled the Bawku Central Member to join the House of Honourables.
Many Ghanaians are at pains trying to understand why the Minister of Information could so descend on the Founder of the Party, when the issues raised by the former Head of State resonate with the ordinary man on the street.
If affairs of state had been conducted through ‘sound judgment’ and ‘careful consideration’ as Mr.Ayariga would want Ghanaians to believe, this nation would certainly not be on its knees. As you read this piece, the cedi is tumbling, while the cost of living is shooting through the roof.
In place of concrete measures to bail out the Ghanaian from extreme hardship, leadership appears to have sought refuge in misleading the people. This nation is not sitting pretty. There are Ghanaians out there going to bed on daily basis with their entire household hungry.
In tune with the constitutional mandate of the media, The Chronicle begins a series of exercises today, aimed at naming to shame. Over the next few days, we intend to publish the names of Ministers of State, Regional Ministers as well as Deputy Ministers, who, in our opinion, have failed to do justice to their briefs.
As former President Jerry Rawlings pointed out, the other day, there are too many dead woods in this administration who need to give way to fresh ideas. Our intention is to help the President carry out his constitutional responsibility of relieving the average Ghanaian from extreme hardship.
It is a fact of life that the global economy has occasioned hardships in many countries across the globe. In our case, there is clear evidence though that misapplication of state resources and a clever ploy to “create loot and share,” my apologies to Justice Jones Dotse, have conspired to deny the ordinary man and woman resources to improve the quality of his or her life.
The GHc8.7 billion spent without authority from Parliament in a clever ploy to buy the vote of the people in the 2012 Presidential and Parliamentary elections, dubious judgment debts contrived to steal state resources in millions of Ghana cedis, as clearly demonstrated by the report on the Ghana Youth Employment and Entrepreneurial Agency and lack of proactive measures from Cabinet ministers to the crisis on the economic front, combine to complete a picture of adventure seekers clothed in administrative garb.
An administration that has failed to construct the 31.7 kilometre Suhum Apedwa stretch of the Accr-Kumasi Highway, cannot certainly claim to be serious.
In our considered view, this administration would do well to shed its load of never do wells. It pains me to criticize President John Dramani Mahama. He is a lovely character and a good friend. On the other hand, I am mindful of the hat I wear as a journalist mandated by the highest law of the land, to call the government and its agencies to order, when things are not right.
It is this burning desire to stand up to my obligations under Article 162 (4) that burns in me like a raging fire. I shall return!