Return of CPP assets: Mahama has failed to keep 2015 promise – Ernesto Yeboah

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Ernesto Yeboah



Ernesto Yeboah

CPP National Youth Organiser Ernesto Yeboah has criticized President John Mahama for failing to fulfill his promise to return assets belonging to the Convention Peoples’ Party (CPP).

Also described as the Commander-In-Chief of the CPP Youth wing, the Nkrumahist recalled that the President in his 2015 State of the Nation Address vowed to return properties confiscated after the overthrow of Ghana’s first president Kwame Nkrumah.

Some of the assets seized under the National Liberation Council junta were the former Ministry of Information Building, the current Eastern and Ashanti Regional Offices of the Ghana Education Service, the Brong Ahafo Regional Police Command, Birth and Death Registry of the Central Region.

“It has been a whole year now and one cannot tell what is being done. It is said that justice delayed is justice denied and the CPP has been denied justice for half a century”, a statement from the CPP Youth wing said.

President John Mahama completed his 2016 State of the Nation Address with a reference to the overthrow of President Kwame Nkrumah 50 years ago on 24th February 1966.

But he made no mention of the state of implementation of his promise to the independence-winning party.

Read full CPP statement

MAHAMA MUST END ILLEGAL SEIZURE OF CPP ASSETS

The great Martin Luther King Jnr. of blessed memory made an eternally true assertion that; ‘Justice is indivisible, Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere’.

This rousing statement holds truer today when viewed in the context of the injustices that some groups or persons in Ghana are suffering; despite the coming into being of the 1992 constitution, which was purposed to reinstate the rule of law and the tenets of freedom and Justice in the country.


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The CPP Youth League finds it a very sad and rather unfortunate event to have to continue pricking the conscience of the government for it to avail fully the fundamental and inalienable rights due this political party and its members in Ghana. This particular case is in relation to the continued illegal confiscation of the party’s assets nationwide.

The CPP Youth League finds it curious, absurd, unwarranted, unacceptable and most unjust that the government till today maintains a strangle hold on the party’s assets. One would have expected that since the return of the party to constitutional rule over twenty(20) years ago, unjust and criminal decrees, such as were passed by the Military Junta of the NLC, would no more have a place in our good statute books.

Unfortunately, our government has chosen to uphold laws by an NLC that came into power through guns and bayonets; the murder of over 2,500 and the maiming of more than 3000 citizens, not to count the rape of our women and the general abuse that ensued.
In upholding antiquated and unjust laws such as NLCD 154, laws which were decreed with no mandate from Ghanaians, the government still holds in its possession properties that lawfully belong to the Convention Peoples Party. The fact that government still has in its possession the former Ministry of Information Building, the current Eastern and Ashanti Regional Offices of the Ghana Education Service, The Brong Ahafo Regional Police Command, Birth and Death Registry of the Central Region, are all manifestations of the illegal precedents this democratic government is still upholding. This is so because, these properties and many more others, are bona fide properties of the CPP.

It is interesting to note that, governments, since the Jerry John Rawlings era have through the Assets Restoration Committee 9ARC) delivered back to Ghanaians assets that were duly theirs; but were earlier confiscated by illegal regimes of our past. Former President J.A Kufuor, under the auspices of the National Reconciliation Process, released some assets to some Ghanaians and Ghanaian companies; notable among them include; Mr Matthew N. Teteh of Uniclean Limited (15 properties); Krobo Edusei (13 properties); Dr E. Ayeh Kumi (13 properties); the late General Akwasi Amankwa Afrifa (3 properties), Kufi Gu (6 properties) and 132 others.

Conspicuously missing in this list is the CPP; and as I quoted at the beginning of this release, justice is indivisible. Curiously, the Siaw family suffers the same fate as the CPP. Their TATA Brewery assets, which were confiscated (beginning from the Kofi Abrefia Busia regime of the Progress Party), are yet to be given back – despite several efforts by the family.

The burning question therefore is; why should some groups or individuals be granted justice while others left to suffer? Why should a law passed by coup makers be used to continue the seizure of assets of a party that was elected into government by more than 87% of the Ghanaian people?

The duplicitous stance of government rings louder in this instance when one of its wings – the Electoral Commission(EC)- insists that all parties must have the required number of offices nationwide. In another breath, this same government is illegally holding in its possession properties of the CPP – properties which should be serving the party to meet the said EC requirement – So where is the justice?

While the President, John Dramani Mahama, stated in his last State of the Nation Address that the matter of the CPP’s assets is being looked into, it has been a whole year now and one cannot tell what is being done. It is said that justice delayed is justice denied and the CPP has been denied justice for half a century. So it is only right and justifiable to ask; how long shall this illegality continue?

In view of the fact that there is apparently little or no commitment on the part of the current government to see justice done; the CPP Youth League calls on all democratic minded persons and all international institutions that uphold human rights and justice globally – especially Amnesty International and the Mo Ibrahim Foundation; to use their reputable diplomatic efforts and relentless quest for good governance to bring good reason to bear on John Dramani Mahama and the government, so that they can do the right and just thing without any more delay.

-Myjoyonline

 


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