For speaking freely in what she thought was a safe environment, Ms Victoria Hammah, until recently the deputy Minister of Communications, has now become the scapegoat for corruption of the Ghanaian body politic.
A number of prominent National Democratic Congress (NDC) members have tied her dismissal to indiscretion and private greed instead of the generalized state of frenzied looting her conversation portrayed of the government.
NDC members have conveniently sidestepped the issue of how Ms Hammah intended to raise her $1,000,000 handshake from her planned short-term political engagement and have focused rather on the recorder of the spicy conversation.
The point that her statements came after scandals involving payment of Ghc51 million to businessman Alfred Agbesi Woyome for unclear damages.
More judgement debts over the importation of 86 Hundai galloper 4-wheel vehicles still rusting in the sun, the GYEEDA scandal, again involving Ghc200 million expected to be refunded for no work done, and more makes her goal of pocketing $1,000,000 a no pipe dream.
Yet many NDC commentators have chosen rather to focus on the mechanics and legalities of recording private conversation rather than confront the serious issues raised by Ms Hammah.
A member of the National Democratic Congress, Lawyer Kakra Essamuah, for instance, has called on the government to seek a court order banning the airing of leaked controversial tapes on radio.
Mr. Essamuah said he has heard there are several other controversial tapes, akin to what has been described as the ‘Vikileaks’ waiting to be played on air and the government must be proactive.
“They [the tapes] cannot be played because the state can take an order from the court against the publication or dissemination [of a tape] that was obtained without legal authority,” he told Kojo Asare Baffour Acheampong, host of Asempa FM’s political talk show programme Ekosii Sen on Monday.
Describing the content of the leaked tape as a “gossipy bombast,” the NDC man said the government should not allow any further airing of such tapes. Mr. Essamuah dismissed accusations of cover-up if the government were to take such an action.
The NDC man is convinced beyond every shadow of doubt that the leaked tape, which has caused the deputy Minister of Communications her position, was procured criminally.
An interesting reaction came from the ex-NC MP for Adenta constituency, Kojo Adu-Asare, who expressed bewilderment at the way and manner the deputy Minister of Communication “washed her party’s dirty linen on phone.”
Mr. Kojo Adu-Asare’s choice of words might not have been deliberate, but ‘dirty linen’ is not an imaginary good.
