AL-SMITH: Prez Mahama’s attempts to save face with Dzamefe too little, too late.


Joy Sports’ Gary Al-Smith​ was on the Super Morning Show on Thursday morning to give the latest insight on the Justice Dzamefe Commission which was put together to investigate happenings that led to Ghana’s fiasco at the last World Cup. 

Sources at the Presidency tell Joy FM that the Commission’s report will be finally received next week, together with that of the Sole Commissioner’s report as well.

This is three months after the commission finished work in December and a month after the commission last wrote to the Presidency, asking for time to get an audience with President Mahama to submit their report. 

Why the Dzamefe Commission report delayed?
Officially, because of the change of the Chief of Staff – that’s the official reason.

However, political watchers say a more accurate response is due to a lack of political will.

In my opinion, the President has not taken the commission seriously. Months after the commission started its work, I can tell you that the President had not even spoken to the lead commissioner, which is very abnormal.

Also, sources say that months into commission’s work, basic things like per diems and other needs hadn’t been paid. This was really unfortunate.

Why the president has not been proactive on the commission has been baffling, because it is not like anyone will be punished. Remember, the Commission of Inquiry was only an inquisitorial body, not prosecutorial or adversorial – it was not meant to punish anyone. 

This failure to receive the report on time has been a huge political opportunity missed, although the Presidency may not admit it. That’s because he could have taken the commission’s report at the start of the year and made a strong political statement with it. 

And also, why didn’t the president mention it in his State of the Nation’s address? That would have got him at least three points!

But it’s clear he did not want to ruffle the Afcon 2015 campaign and after the team reached the final, it was again clear the Commission’s work was always going to be redundant, which is sad.

Whoever advises the president on these sporting issues, I am strongly of the opinion that they got it wrong – again. 

It is true that for democracy to function properly, we need commissions to learn from our mistakes, but these are costly to the taxpayer and so if the Presidency wastes time in implementation, we have to ask questions about such wastes of time. 

Not just time, but cost as well. A few sources at the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation say about 80,000 cedis went down the drain because of lost advertising revenue.

Imagine what such an amount could have done.
Bottom line is this: the president failed to milk this great opportunity to tell Ghanaians that he is a man who finishes what he starts.

Gary is with the Joy Sports team and was speaking on the Super Morning Show with Nhyira Addo.

  Story by Ghana/Joy Sports/Gary Al-Smith


More Sports News »


Comments:
This article has 0 comment, leave your comment.