Akufo-Addo was an active CPP member, so what? – NPP-USA

NPP-USA is at a loss to find what is so damaging about loudmouth Kwesi Pratt's so- called revelation that the NPP's 2016 Presidential Candidate, Nana Akufo-Addo was an active CPP member before joining the UP tradition. According to Starr FM Online ("Akufo-Addo was an active CPP member – Pratt alleges", Ghanaweb.com, 9 February 2015), Kwesi Pratt says "In one of those conversations, he told me that one [sic] February 24, 1966; his name was on the list of the CPP activists who were to be arrested and the only reason why he was not detained was the fact of his father being key in the events of those days."

What NPP-USA finds farcical is the seriousness with which Kwesi Pratt displays his hollow logic. He seems to be operating under the assumption that his so-called revelation is earth-shattering news but actually, it is not. Firstly, if Nana has "told this story to many of us", as Kwesi Pratt says, then obviously it is no secret.

Secondly, if Nana Akufo-Addo was a member of the CPP tradition up to February 24, 1966, that does not make him culpable for, or even an accessory to the atrocities that the CPP perpetrated under Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, including the obnoxious death of Dr. J. B. Danquah in detention at Nsawam. Perhaps the inhumanity and despotic tendencies of Nkrumah and the CPP are some of the reasons that drove Nana Akufo-Addo to the UP tradition.

Thirdly, Nana Addo is not the only person who was an active CPP member, but then crossed carpet to join the United Party. In fact, UP stalwarts like Victor Owusu, who later became the party's presidential candidate, was an active CPP member before he joined the UP. Likewise Mr. Joe Appiah, who as a CPP member was very close to Nkrumah, but joined the National Liberation Movement after his friendship with Nkrumah was ruined. The NLM later merged with other opposition parties to form the United Party. In recent memory, Mr. Freddie Blay was an active CPP member, and is now a strong member and First Vice-Chairman of the NPP.

Even here in the United States, political evolution of individuals is not uncommon. For instance, the late President Ronald Reagan was a staunch Democrat, supporting Franklin D. Roosevelt and his New Deal, before he himself became a conservative Republican, and President of the United States on the Republican ticket. It behooves the naïve Kwesi Pratt to also note that Mr. Obed Asamoah was an active UP member before he became a member of the NDC.

NPP-USA would have dismissed this so-called revelation as the ranting of a dry alcoholic, but for the fact that it throws light on Kwesi Pratt's character as a pathological traitor who lacks integrity. Recent history shows that Kwesi Pratt is a traitor who cannot be trusted because he can sell a cause for a bottle of whiskey.

In the few days following the illegal overthrow of President Hilla Limman by Rawlings, a group that included Kwesi Pratt held secret meetings in Accra plotting to counter Rawlings' coup. That group had the sympathy of Sergeant Akata Pore, who was also a member of the PNDC. Akata Pore even attended some of their meetings.

One day, Akata Pore was shocked to find Kwesi Pratt at Rawlings' office with a bottle of whiskey in hand. Pratt had voluntarily walked into Burma Camp and asked to see Rawlings. During that meeting with Rawlings, Pratt revealed the names of all the members of the secret group, which he himself belonged to. Akata Pore vehemently denied his participation in that group, and even volunteered to have his boys pick up members of the group. His thinking was that if he and his boys were in control of that group, he could also control how they were treated and interrogated. If Rawlings' own boys had gone to pick them up they would have wiped out the entire group.

Kwesi Pratt betrayed members of his own group including Kweku Baako whose house served as their meeting location, and whose mother fed them as they met. That is how Kweku Baako ended up serving prison time under the Rawlings military regime.

Is this the Kwesi Pratt that Ghanaians now take seriously as a credible voice on radio and television? We at NPP-USA have never been impressed with Kwesi Pratt's level of intellect, his sense of patriotism, his credibility, and above all his ability to tell the truth even when he knows it. Discerning Ghanaians must take whatever comes out of Kwesi Pratt's foul mouth with a grain of salt.