NPP-USA: Ablakwa Flaunts his Team B Logic

As the saying goes, "empty barrels make the most noise." No current officeholder in Ghana better exemplifies the NDC government’s self-admitted Team B line-up than Deputy Minister Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa. In his latest joke, the pompous and rude Ablakwa put out a compilation titled: "A BUNDLE OF CONTRADICTIONS." Little did he know that what he found to be contradictory, even a Junior High School student would deem to be in order. Someone needs to inform the Deputy Minister that he happens to have been placed into a position for which a little bit more analysis is needed to make sense out of issues. And if he finds those NPP positions contradictory, it simply means that the issues are too complex for him and far above his pay grade.

Mr. Ablakwa writes: "*The NPP accuse President Mills of being slow and sometimes even say he is moving backwards slowly but surely. At the same time they are accusing President Mills of being too fast. The NPP says in the recent Yendi swoop that President Mills is acting with "indecent haste" as contained in a press conference read on behalf of the Minority by Deputy Minority Leader Hon. Ambrose Derry. In the Matter of the Ghana International Airline Limited and Ghana @ 50 prosecutions, the NPP again accuse President Mills of rushing. What are we to believe, is the NDC Govt and Prof. Mills slow or too fast? *

Is Mr. Ablakwa saying he does not understand how someone can be too hasty on one issue and yet be incompetently slow on another? A 12-year-old understands that. Certainly the deputy minister should know that when an Independent Wuako Commission’s Report calls for some named individuals on both sides of the Yendi conflict to be arrested, but the President sends national security personnel to arrest people on only one side of the dispute, that rush to judgment and selective arrest can properly be characterized as "indecent haste." In this case, the very people on the list to be arrested are the ones leading the police into the homes of their adversaries at dawn to be arrested.

On the prosecution of the Ghana@50 and GIA matters, the haste with which this out-of-control NDC government is prosecuting former NPP officials is in sharp contrast from its lackluster attitude towards members of the Rawlings administration who have been named as having received bribes from a defendant who was duly convicted of bribery in a court of law. More importantly, this administration seems to be turned on by politically-motivated arrests and prosecutions. Again the haste with which they indulge in that activity contrasts sharply with the turtle steps they are taking in coming to grips with the nation’s mounting problems. So yes, Mr. Ablakwa, your government is painfully slow on some very important matters while acting with the speed of lightning when it comes to persecuting its adversaries.

Mr. Ablakwa further writes: *"The NPP Minority in Parliament has gone on record that President Mills is setting up too many Committees and has even stated that they amounted to waste of time and resources. However, only recently, in the press conference addressed by the Deputy Minority Leader Hon. Ambrose Derry, the NPP stated that they insist that a new Commission should be set up by the President to look into the Murder of the Yaa Naa as stated in the NDC Manifesto. Are there too many Committees and Commissions or not?" * Leadership entails decision-making. At the presidential level, that responsibility becomes even more important. What we have seen with President Mills is that whenever he is called upon to make any decision, he sets up a committee or a commission—a convenient way to channel sitting allowances into the pockets of NDC partisans and friends. There are committees set up for such conclusive issues as NDC MP Mubarak’s culpability of the accusations leveled against him, and such overreaching areas as reviewing the constitution. Meanwhile, for someone devoted to outsourcing decision-making to commissions and committees of dubious merit, President Mills has ignored the findings of the Wuako Commission set up to investigate the Ya Na death, and is selectively targeting one faction of the conflict for arrest. It is based upon this betrayal of justice that the minority in Parliament insisted that Mills sets up his own commission to look into the issue given its importance.

Here is another example of an issue that seems too complex for the deputy minister to comprehend: *"The NPP has accused President Mills of not living up to his manifesto promises. They often cite the promise to work towards the engagement of 40% women appointees and to attend the party’s congresses and conferences. However, the NPP has been up in arms against the decision to change the Senior High School duration from 4 to 3 years though it is also a major manifesto promise. Should President Mills keep his manifesto promises or not?" * This is a classic example of an administration focusing on the wrong things. If there ever was a time to take our time to educate our young, this period of high unemployment is that time. Rather, this incompetent NDC government appears to be in haste to turn out ill-educated high school graduates, only for them to join the teeming numbers of the unemployed. For the first time in almost a decade, Ghanaians are having to queue for petrol; there is no money in the system to patronize local businesses, resulting in a record number of businesses folding; economic crisis is evident on the face of Ghanaians. And what is most important to this administration? Change the high school duration from four years to three.

Further, President Mills promised to be the "Father of All," create jobs for the youth, and rein in corruption. Instead what has he done? He has presided over an era during which his party functionaries have murdered political opponents, eliminated jobs, and put the NDC stamp on corruption and self-dealing. For example, former president Rawlings is said to have been handed a check for $5 million apparently to keep his mouth shut. The Castle has been turned into a Used Car dealership, their inventory consisting of cars dispossessed from hardworking and innocent Ghanaians. And those are the most recent corrupt cases in the still young administration. So Mr. Ablakwa, it is not too complicated to suggest that Mills is not keeping your party’s manifesto.

Ablakwa goes on: *"The NPP shouts loudly every day that President Mills and his Government should listen to Former President Rawlings who is warning that the country is moving slowly and that now he doesn’t even know the direction. However, in the Yaa Naa, Ghana @ 50 and Ghana International Airline trials, the NPP is accusing President Mills of succumbing to the pressures of Former President Rawlings. Should President Mills listen to Former President Rawlings or not?" * First, Rawlings may be wrong 95% of the time, but he was right on point when he warned that Ghana is heading in the wrong direction under Mills. Did Ablakwa expect the NPP to disagree with Rawlings merely because he is Rawlings? Unfortunately, that 5% of the time when Rawlings is right happens to be the very time Mills chooses to tune him out. And the 95% of the time when Rawlings is wrong is precisely when President Mills decides to be all ears. Thus the answer to Ablakwa’s question is "no" – Mills should be his own man for a change.

Here he goes again: *"You will recall that in the early days of the NDC Government, the popular refrain from the NPP was that the new Government should stop seizing or arresting cars and arrest the depreciating cedi. Now, the cedi has been stabilized and has even appreciated at some point against all the major currencies. In a shocking twist, the NPP has changed its position stating that this doesn’t matter. Their 2008 Flag bearer even puts it worse in his recent press interaction when he postulates that any Senior High School Economics student can achieve the macro-economic gains we have chalked over the last 15 months."*

The alarming rate at which the cedi had been losing value, both internally and against our major trading currencies, was a major concern to all Ghanaians, not just members of the NPP. Now that the cedi has stabilized temporarily, is the deputy minister saying that all our economic problems have been solved? Now that the NPP has gotten the out-of-control NDC government to sit up, we now turn our attention to other economic challenges facing our country. And if the deputy minister cannot understand this simple logic, may be calling him a Team B minister is actually a compliment.

Jermaine Nkrumah PRO, NPP-USA