Indeed, any throat-slasher dreads of lying flat on their back

A very popular Akan proverb to cast insinuation at a wicked person who turns around to protest against a perceived harm about to be inflicted on him by others, goes thus, "Atwitwa mmene biara suro ayeya nda". Literally translated into English as, "Any throat-slasher dreads of lying flat on their back". It is mostly when you lie flat on your back with your throat facing up that a throat-slasher can easily slash it with a stroke of his sharp knife or cutlass/machete, hence such expert murderers always avoiding sleeping in that position, so the adage imports.

Tuesday, 15 December 2020, from about 07:00 to 07:30, I could hear Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwah (Hon) grant a radio interview to Kwame Nkrumah Tikese, the host of Ade Akye Abia morning show on Okay FM. The interview was principally centred on the NDC's refusal to accept the declaration of the presidential and parliamentary election results by the Chairperson of the Electoral Commission, Mrs Jean Mensah, the sole person constitutionally mandated to organise and declare presidential or general election results.

Okudzeto was insisting on the legality, permissibility and acceptance of the NDC picketing, demonstrating publicly and agitating, however they see it fit, to compel the Electoral Commission to rather declare presidential-candidate John Dramani Mahama and the NDC as the winners of the 2020 Elections. He would not budge to any suggestion to him and the NDC going to the Supreme Court to seek redress of their grievance.

Why is he so scared of going to the Supreme Court to challenge the election verdict as contrary did the NPP in Election 2012 when they felt short-changed by the NDC and then Chairman of the Electoral Commission, Dr Kwadwo Afari Gyan? Is going to the Supreme Court not the best option out of all the picketing and various threats to kill members of the NPP, the President and even cause the military to stage a coup d'état to kick President Nana Akufo-Addo and the NPP out of government?

Okudzeto was persistently citing and blaming the Electoral Commission of going against their very edifying motto. The Electoral Commission's motto is, "Transparency, Fairness and Integrity", he kept quoting. Why then are they not showing any level of transparency, fairness and also lacking integrity as far as their declaration of Election 2020 results go, he queried? They are not adhering to their own golden principles, he lamented.

Let us define the individual components of the EC's motto according to the Cambridge dictionary.

Transparency: "the quality of being done in an open way without secrets" or "the characteristic of being easy to see through"

Fairness: "the quality of treating people equally or in a way that is right or reasonable"

Integrity: "the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles that you refuse to change"

Mr Okudzeto Ablakwah fervently expects the EC to uphold its motto to the spirit and letter of its specification. However, the NDC including himself, neither respect nor uphold the very cardinal pivotal principles of Probity, Accountability and Transparency on which their revolutionary NDC party revolves. Their failure to significantly abide by the three visionary principles conceived by their party's founding father, the late former President Jerry John Rawlings, gave cause to him always bemoaning the NDC for not living up to the expectations of the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC), and his aim of staging that coup d'état in the first place.

Again, let us define the three principles on which the NDC was formed but has miserably failed to live up to their expectation.

Probity: "the quality of being honest and behaving correctly"

Accountability: "the fact of being responsible for what you do and able to give a satisfactory reason for it, or the degree to which this happens"

Transparency: "the quality of being done in an open way without secrets" or "the characteristic of being easy to see through"

Have the NDC ever attempted to fully or partially subscribe to the three tenets as just stated above? No! If they had, we would not be sitting as a nation today, bleeding of official corruption through the bloating of government contracts and kickbacks and "create, loot and share" judgment debt payments on the watch of NDC presidents.

I do not support anyone or any institution that does not live by their own preached principles and ideals. Much the same way, I hate hypocrites who preach virtues in broad daylight but commit vices under the cover of darkness, the character of the NDC.

It is painful to see the pot calling the kettle you are dark. The NDC accuse and blame everybody for doing wrong but themselves. They have the impetus to accuse the EC of failure to practically demonstrate their motto, yet, they, the NDC, do worse things than the EC.

In order not to be verbose today, let me ask the NDC why one Mary Adatsi, a polling station agent contracted by the EC, was serving ballots to some voters at a polling station on 7 December 2020, without the portion of Nana Akufo-Addo on the ballot sheet? Why was she intentionally tearing off that portion featuring presidential-candidate Nana Akufo-Addo to favour John Dramani Mahama? Why were NDC posters and thumb-printed ballot in favour of John Dramani Mahama posted on the walls of a polling station in the Volta region on the election day with electorates queued up to cast their vote? Were those two instances among many, in conformity with election regulations as per the Constitutional Instrument 127 (CI 127)? No, they were in direct contravention of the election rules.

The NDC are noted for accusing the NPP of the very wrongdoings they, the NDC, are secretly indulged in. By their actions, are they any different from the descriptive throat-slasher as in the Akan proverb? No!!! Why have they chosen the path of violence to resolving their dissatisfaction with the declaration of the election results than to going to the Supreme Court, the better alternative for achieving their aim?

It's all because of the "Atwitwa mmene" scenario!