Government Nepotism: ‘Silent’ CSOs, traditional, religious leaders hypocrites - Mahama

Former President of the Republic of Ghana John Dramani Mahama has said the silence of the voices of conscience when things are going wrong makes them hypocrites.

The former President joined his party’s deputy General Secretary Koku Ayidoho to encourage Pastor Dr Mensah Otabil to cut the “hypocrisy” of watching animals when the realities of President Akufo-Addo’s “Kwaku Ananse” government was facing him (Otabil).

The former President who has little or no resistance when it comes to commenting on hot issues in Ghana since his humiliating defeat in the 2016 elections was addressing NDC party executives in the United Kingdom:

“In our time they were not watching animals, they were watching political discussions. You’re now tired of too much politics…you’ll be tired, because your darling government is super incompetent and so you’re tired of hearing the analysis, that’s the hypocrisy we face in our country. So let us not buy into their propaganda”, he told the UK Branch Executives of the party.

He called out CSOs, traditional, religious leaders and the media for their double standards in holding the NPP government accountable and on its toes regarding the numerous family and friends appointments going on under President Akufo-Addo, compared to the criticism his government faced.

He berated their hypocrisy:

“Something is pardonable when one government is in power but when another is in power it’s unpardonable, things that the media would have been so loud about under my administration, it happens every day and it’s like it’s business as usual. That is the hypocrisy of our civil society and religious and traditional leaders, everybody is quiet, suddenly some say they don’t watch TV anymore and that they watch animals.”

“I never ever thought that Ghanaians will tolerate the level of nepotism in the government we see today, it’s terrible, I never ever thought. In our case one of our own said I was running a family and friends government and NPP took it up, when I had no blood relation of mine in government except for some lonely deputy minister, Joyce Bawa Mogtari, my aunt’s daughter. She was the only blood relation in my government and yet they said family and friends and when you ask where are they, they say ooo, but your own person said it.” He said.

“Now today look at it, that’s the new standard and yet civil society is quiet, religious and traditional leaders are quiet. When NDC comes the next time and Alabi or Bagbin or who is the President and they appoint their relatives into government are they now coming to come out and say it?”, he quizzed.

“Must the standards of measuring standards differ because of who is in the presidency? That is the hypocrisy of our politics, that’s the height of hypocrisy we have in Ghana,” he added.