Gov’t yet to prove coup allegation, BUT ...

President John Kufuor personally and his government collectively have so far been unable to prove and provide evidence to support claims that former president Jerry Rawlings is planning a coup d’etat.

At a recent political party rally in his home region of Ashanti, President Kufuor announced that he has received security intelligence reports that predecessor has visited an oil rich country to solicit for funds to overthrow the government.

While the president’s aides, party and government spokespersons have variously repeated the allegations almost verbatim, one has so far responded to the queries from journalists and a challenge from the former president to back their allegations with evidence.

At a press conference called to react to Jerry Rawlings’ reaction to the coup allegation, Information Minister Kwamena Bartels flanked by other ministers of state and government spokespersons did not provide the requested evidence, stating though that government is convinced that the former is planning to truncate the second-term of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) administration.

Mr. Bartels also announced that judging from the history of Jerry Rawlings as a two-time successful coup maker he (JJ) must be placed under close surveillance.

He will also not make a categorical statement on whether there are any immediate plans to arrest and prosecute the former president for treason if government has the evidence that he is planning any subversive acts.

In what could easily pass for a hours of a well- packaged history lecture for University students, the Information minister took newsmen, listeners to radio stations and live TV audience back to the antecedents of President Rawlings and his PNDC/NDC administrations.

Using pictorial images with the help of a projector to illustrate his point, Mr. Bartels whose portfolio also includes National Orientation gave an expose of past human rights abuses and alleged corrupt activities under the PNDC & NDC regimes.

Supported able by Ministers for the Interior, Aviation, Chieftaincy & Culture, Finance, a battalion of spokespersons and his deputy Oboshie Sai Cofie, Mr. Bartels strongly denied allegations of corruption, white-washing of Kufuor by western leaders, western media control and atrocities against Ghanaians by the former president.

“…most world leaders who have met President Kufuor admire and respect the president and having seen how in a short period of just about six years, he has been able to turn Ghana’s economy around, instituted respect for human rights and observance of the rule of law, and has deepened democratic rule in Ghana,” says the Information Minister.

“Let me emphasize that under this administration, ladies and gentlemen, there have been no political detainees in our prisons, no kangaroo courts such as the Citizens Vetting Committee and the Tribunals during the PNDC era, and no journalists being thrown into our prisons for either speaking their mind or publishing what they believe to be true. Can we honestly say that Mr. Rojo Mettle-Nunoo will be walking free and sleeping in his bedroom if it was ex-President Rawlings that he insulted on radio during the PNDC/NDC era?,” Bartels further adds.

On the specific allegations of an imminent coup d’etat by Jerry Rawlings, Mr. Bartels said, “nobody in this country, who has had the experience of Rawlings from 1979 to date, or who has made even a cursory study of Ghana’s history, would make the mistake of believing that given the chance, the ex-president would not organize another coup. The pattern has always bee clear”.

Quoting a statement allegedly made by Jerry Rawlings in London recently (if lies, atrocities and corruption that has bedeviled the Kufuor Government in Ghana continued, there will be a coup to arrest the injustice going on), Mr. Bartels stated that this could be nothing short of an intention by Jerry Rawlings to stage another coup in Ghana.

Meanwhile, like the former president and his successor, the Minister for Information and National Orientation did not hesitate to make series of allegations against the Rawlings’.

“…wasn’t it the same ex-president Rawlings who literally ‘supervised’ the beating of his own opponents within the NDC which led to the resignation of ex-MP Kofi Asante and Dr. Obed Asamoah who have now formed the DFP?...where does former President Rawlings get the moral right to make such unfounded allegations of atrocities against President Kufuor?”

Bartels further alleges that the ex-president cannot talk about corruption when he epitomizes corruption. He said Rawlings’ opulent life-style as shown in the Ovation Magazine recently contradicts his earlier believes.

Providing pictorial evidence on the projector, Bartels alleges that the former president owns a riverside resort in Sogakofe, speed boats, mansion in Dublin Ireland, pays his children’s expensive school fees abroad, purchased four 4-wheel bullet proof vehicles which were cleared at a cost of 500 million cedis, has expensive Jaguar vehicles, is about to complete a new mansion in Adjirigano and owns expensive exotic dogs.

He goes on: “…under the cover of Mrs. Konadu Agyeman Rawlings’31st December Women’s Movement together with International Generics Ltd the Rawlings’ purchased the former Star Hotel for one billion cedis and instead of developing it into a modernized hotel of not less that 200 rooms as has been signed into the agreement with the DIC, decided to demolish the entire hotel and build expensive residential estates for sale… the same thing happened to what is now known as the La Palm Royal Beach Hotel where an ECGD credit line was used to purchase the property and subsequently sold to SSNIT.”

Apart from alleging that the ex-president and his wife instructed Ghana’s ambassador to Switzerland to release US$30,000 for the wife’s treatment without the president’s authorization, Kwamena Bartels also said that the couple insisted that the money be released on Rawlings’ authority.

According to him, it is the Rawlings’ pride and the refusal because of the pride to contact John Kufuor for the release of the money that ignited their hatred for the Kufuor administration.

Meanwhile the specific question of which oil-rich country’s president was contacted by Jerry Rawlings to solicit funds for a coup d’etat as alleged by the president remains unanswered.