Presidents all over the world try to learn some useful presidential habits.
Speak less, listen more. Don’t make hasty conclusions. Don’t be indecisive or dither. If you decide, decide. Calculate your responses with caution as your guard post. Learn to bridle your mouth when the kitchen becomes too hot and quickly uncoil yourself from the grip of your political opponents without any insult. When you get the opportunity to address the people, speak in terse, clipped phrases. They can sound refreshingly candid.
Prove no man to trifle with and above all respect the citizenry because they made you who you are today. As a leader, just believe people are a mass to be shaped and formed for their own best interest. The truth, like a curative medicine, is always bitter, but tell the people nothing but the truth. And above all, remember there are people who are more intelligent than you are so you cannot hoodwink all the people all the time.
President John Mahama has refused to learn these simple presidential habits and continues to thumb our noses as if we don’t matter as a people living in a country and contributing our quota in nation building in one way or the other. He thinks he is the only one who can spit fire, forgetting that everyone has red saliva in his or her mouth but we decide to spit out the white one for the sake of peace. As the number one gentleman of this country of 24 million souls, if this is the way he is going to go, then I am sorry his best is not good enough for Ghana.
It all started when the MP for Assin Fosu, Mr. Kennedy Agyapong literally “declared war” against some tribes in the run-up to the 2012 elections following some violence meted out to a particular tribe in Accra.
When the gentleman was arrested and put before court and charged with treason, the former President of Ghana, Mr. John Agyekum Kufuor came out to condemn the firebrand politician and added that what the government did too was not the best and that the action of government was like trying to kill a fly with a sledgehammer. Before the old man could shut his old mouth up, Mr. Mahama shot back, saying the government will rather use a bulldozer to kill a fly. See the insolence and insult in the comment of the President?
Then the issue of mortgaging our oil for the three billion-dollar Chinese loan came up for debate and some opposition members said it was not the best. Instead of the man allowing his spokesperson to reply the critics he himself was heard telling Ghanaians that it was “foolish” and “baloney” to suggest that we should not use the oil to mortgage for the loan. We shut our big mouths up.
After all, is he not the Commander-In-Chief? The truth is that when Mr. Dramani Mahama was not the president of this country we saw a respectable young man growing with wisdom. He was never heard insulting anyone and he was loved by all, including the opposition members of the political divide. He spoke with measured caution and will never hurt a fly. Times have changed and power has corrupted the fine guy. No more boys on the bus glow.
John Dramani Mahama’s insolence reached an all time peak when he told us that wise politicians won’t rebuke him and those who disapprove his policies are unwise or foolish, to put it blatantly. As for the politicians in the opposition they should not worry if they are described as unwise anytime they criticize the President because in time of war everything is fair. You don’t expect your opponent to say good things about you. But what about those in government who continue to disapprove certain policies of the John Mahama administration? The role call is long but my dear cherished reader, permit me to mention just a few of such politicians in the John Mahama party who at one time or the other “foolishly” criticized him.
Mr. Jerry John Rawlings, the founder of the party in power told Ghanaians that the President was delaying in reshuffling his team and that there are mediocre and incompetent ministers in the government. He even once told us that the government was loaded with greedy bastards and babies with sharp teeth. The man told us that the John Mahama administration was corrupt and that the high time he changed his ministers, the better. From what Mr. Mahama told us, it stands to reason that Mr. Rawlings’ comment or Mr. Rawlings himself is unwise.
Hon. Sumani Alban Bagbin has been in Parliament since 1992. He has served as a Minority Leader and Majority Leader in Parliament. He served under Mr. Rawlings’ administration as well as that of the late President Mills. He is a dye in the wool NDC man and has contributed meaningfully to the growth of the party.
He told the good people of Ghana that much as he tried to see the President at the Flagstaff House to discuss certain pertinent issues with him, he could not. According to this affable and well-liked lawmaker, there are some powerful men at the seat of government who would not like him to see the President for reasons best known to them.
He said at a point in time when he had the President on his cell phone he told the President that since he was being barred from seeing him, he was going to go to town. And he really did. He told us the President has surrounded himself with some corrupt officials and that the corruption in the John Mahama administration stings so high. If John Mahama is telling us that politicians who criticize his administration are unwise then it stands to reason again that Mr. Bagbin is unwise and so his name cannot be included in the list of “Three Wise Men” he appointed. So you see how an unbridled mouth can cause trouble.”
President Mahama can decide to refer to Nana Konadu Agyemang Rawlings as unwise politician following her demand that chiefs and clergymen should be bold enough to criticize his administration because the woman is not part of them again. She has joined the opposition by forming her own political party and so she deserves to be called an unwise politician.
This is a woman who was the First Lady of this dear country of ours for close to two decades and she is supposed to know more than some of us do as far as governance is concerned because behind every successful man is a woman. John Mahama cannot tell me that he knows all the ministers and other government functionaries he is working with more than the Iron Lady.
If today John Mahama is in power and decides to refer to her as an unwise politician, so be it, but surely the day of reckoning is beckoning. When the chickens come home to roost, we will see who is a wise politician and who is not a wise politician. Anyway, wise Presidents do not crack jokes when delivering the State of the Nation Address. At least Rawlings, Kufuor and Atta Mills never did that.
Senior Monitor Tony Aidoo looked into his crystal ball and told Ghanaians that all the political parties, including the NDC lie to the electorate and that when they finally come to power they do not care a hoot about the welfare of the people who voted them into power. According to John Mahama, the man who still serves in his government is unwise. Now that Tony Aidoo is appointed as an ambassador, we have in our hands His Excellency Unwise Politician Tony Aidoo. And if such an unwise politician is going to represent the interest of Ghanaians abroad, then you can easily know the mess he can cause to the disadvantage of the nation.
From the statement made by no mean a person than the President, the most unwise politician in this country is MBK Lamisi Amidu, the former Attorney General and Minister of Justice. The man unearthed a huge corruption in the payment of Judgment Debt to Alfred Woyome and came out boldly to tell Ghanaians that the whole thing was a gargantuan fraud, a rip-off and that he will do everything in his power to collect the money for Ghanaians.
He called himself a Citizen Vigilante and started spilling the beans. When the secret leaked, the late President Mills was not in the country and when he returned he told Ghanaians that on two occasions he ordered that the money should not be paid but they defied his order.
As the matter kept travelling from the Flagstaff House to the public court of justice, we woke up one fine morning to hear that Martin Amidu has been dismissed as the Attorney General and Minister of Justice. Then the man donned his armour of confrontational discourse and started kicking. He has since not stopped the Kung Fu fighting. That is why President John Dramani Mahama is saying the Citizen Vigilante is an unwise politician. Were you born when we were smoking a cigarette called New Flight? (New Flight for the modern man) Poor you! You were born too late. Let me continue to puff away!!!