At the time President John Evans Atta Mills was pleading with Ghanaians to bear the brunt of his government’s fuel price increases, the leadership of his party, the National Democratic Congress (NDC), was said to be busily amassing wealth to themselves.
Though they accuse members of the previous New Patriotic Party (NPP) administration of amassing wealth to themselves through their ‘property owing’ philosophy, the national and constituency executives of the NDC who pride themselves on being ‘social democrats’ and frown on wealth creation and profligate expenditure are not only buying but also putting up several houses and buying flashy cars.
Member of Parliament for Lower Manya Krobo, Micheal Teye Nyaunu, blew the lid off the whole caboodle when he granted an interview to Accra-based Citi FM, during which he said, “I get reports from many regions of the country and all is not well”, putting the blame at the doorstep of his party executives.
Mr. Nyaunu accused his party executives of relinquishing the duties for which they were voted to occupy those positions.
“I blame some of the party executives who are going round amassing some wealth for themselves to gain some of the little life pleasures that they didn’t get,” he said.
He however did not disclose the names and identities of these individuals who have turned millionaires overnight.
Nyaunu, who once had cause to call on the NDC to change Mills as its Presidential Candidate because of his ill health and failing sight, expressed fear that the NDC could lose the 2012 elections as earlier predicted by the party’s founder, former President Rawlings.
He noted, “I am praying to the good Lord to help us change our strategy before the end of this year.”
He said what baffled him the most was the fact that “during the campaigning, they made us to understand that every member is a shareholder of the organization and the dividends will be shared accordingly. But when it came to appointing DCEs, they ignored the constituency executives who worked so much.”
Instead, he noted, “People who sat in the comfort of radio stations and made a lot of pronouncements were considered to have worked harder than those who walked to the villages and won votes to bring the party into power.”
“Don’t tell me that somebody is a PHD holder, a professor, a doctor and therefore he is more important than those who walked into the villages.
The illiterate, the Form Four leaver and the foot-soldier worked before we won power. When it comes to voting, we all have one vote including the illiterate, the professor and the Doctor.
The grassroots are not happy. All that they are saying is that they must be recognized,” the obviously disgruntled MP said in the heat of his rage.
The MP alleged that some of the NDC executives were giving contracts to members of the opposition NPP for kickbacks and thus made a passionate appeal to President Mills “to wake up and use a better lens than what he is using now.”
This, according to him, would enable the President to reinvestigate the people around him to see how things are going. He added, “We have to pray for the President and acknowledge that he has a clear problem on hand. For me, I wish him the best of luck.”
The MP proceed to accuse former Presidential spokesman and now Deputy Minister of Trade and Industry, Mahama Ayariga of having worked to exclude his name from the list of people the President was considering for appointment.
Mr Nyaunu claimed to have been told by some of his colleagues who were on the President’s appointment committee that Ayariga cancelled his name from the list and substituted it with a different name when he (Nyaunu) had been penciled to become Minister for Youth and Sports.
Ayariga treated this claim with scorn, since he does not have the power to hire and fire, like the President.
But party officials remain tight-lipped about Nyaunu’s allegation.
Most of the national executives including the once tough-talking party General Secretary Johnson Asiedu Nketiah, had switched off their phones whilst Chairman Dr Kwabena Adjei refused to answer his phone.
Kofi Adams and Yaw Boateng Gyan, Deputy General Secretary and National Organizer of the NDC respectively, refused to comment on the subject, giving room for more speculation.
By Charles Takyi-Boadu