‘Clever’ Akufo-Addo was telling Ghanaians about his differences with Rawlings – Kwesi Pratt

“When we are no longer needed, the true story will be told about us,” Kwesi Pratt has observed of the funeral tribute of “clever” President Akufo-Addo to the late Jerry John Rawlings.

Kwesi Pratt Jnr, who spoke on the “Alhaji and Alhaji” TV show on Saturday observed that President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo was very mischievously “clever” when he delivered his tribute at the Independence Square on Wednesday 27 January, by telling Ghanaians the past differences he had with Rawlings.

Pratt explained that by doing so, Akufo-Addo was placing a distance between himself and the late military cum civilian leader of Ghana who had passed away because whatever differences they had spanning several decades had come to an end.

Kwesi Pratt Jnr could not comprehend how Nana Akufo-Addo, who was the chairman of the committee that wrote the ‘Stolen Verdict',- a book on how Rawlings rigged the 1992 elections- was proclaiming Rawlings as one of the best things that happened to Ghana in his tribute.

“Go and read the Stolen Verdict written by Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo and compare the content of the stolen verdict to what he is telling us today,” he observed.

Pratt Jnr. indicated that the late J. J. Rawlings played a key role in Akufo-Addo’s victory in 2016 because Rawlings had already said in an interview that he never voted for his own party. Akufo-Addo publicly thanked Rawlings during his first inauguration speech in 2017 at the Independence Square for an undisclosed role he and Captain Kojo Tsikata, Rawlings's trusted security capo, played in his victory.

Pratt said when were claiming that Akufo-Addo had something against the people of the Volta Region, it was Mr Rawlings who came to his defence.

“He said based on his knowledge of H. E. President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, he could not be a tribalist and that he is a nationalist, those statements being made about him should be ignored,” Pratt quoted Rawlings as saying.

“At the funeral of Mr Rawlings, Nana Akufo-Addo is a very clever leader, he’s so clever and unbelievable. He was telling us about the differences he had with Mr Rawlings. The fact that for some time they could not see eye to eye. That they have political differences and so on,” Pratt observed.

“Why is he telling us now? Because now Mr Rawlings cannot campaign for him, Mr Rawlings cannot disrupt the NDC; he’s dead; he doesn’t need him anymore.”

The actions of President Akufo-Addo, according to Pratt, the Managing Editor of the Insight Newspaper, must be an important lesson to every individual and politicians at large.