Managing Editor of the Insight newspaper, Kwesi Pratt, believes the “goodwill” message issued by flagbearer of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Nana Addo Danquah Akufo-Addo to President Mills, is ill-intentioned and calculated to deepen the public perception that he (Mills) is unfit to run for re-election.
To him, the ‘wording’ of that particular statement was crafted in such a way as to lend credence to the rumour that President Mills was very sick and might pass on to eternal glory pretty shortly.
Questions had been asked about the whereabouts of the president after he had not been seen in public for close to two weeks whilst communal violence ravaged parts of the country.
Indeed, the grapevine through some social networking sites had it that the President had passed away, but a genial looking President Mills, decked in a blue-black suit with a dotted matching tie, told the media before departing for the United States for medical check-up that he had heard rumours.
Whiles wondering the basis for such rumours, he assured Ghanaians that he was just going away for a few days to see his doctors.
Subsequently, the Presidential candidate of the NPP issued a statement wishing the president well on his medical treatment abroad.
“…we have “learnt last night [Sunday] from President Atta Mills that he was on his way to the United States to see doctors for medical treatment…He [Mills] takes with him the thoughts and prayers of all Ghanaians who wish him good health and a safe return to duty in a few days…I hope the checks go well and he comes back fit and strong,” Nana Addo said in the statement.
But the seasoned journalist is clearly not enthused about the content of the message and says it is laced with mischief.
Speaking in an interview with Suhuyini Alhassan on Radio Gold, Kwesi Pratt stated emphatically that “there is not a single goodwill in that message”, but rather the message is “calculated to achieve a diabolical dent” and therefore should be “exposed for what it is”.
“There is no goodwill in that message, that message is part of the mischief because if you read that message very carefully, the intention of that message is to deepen the suspicion that the president is unfit to hold office, is to deepen the suspicion that Mills is so sick that he had to rush out of the country; that is the purpose of the message.
“The president is going out for routine medical examination, the flagbearer of the NPP deliberately states that the president is going for treatment, you only go for treatment when you are sick, so that statement is meant to enforce a rumor that the president is sick because if you are not sick you don’t go for treatment, and the wording was carefully done.
“Beyond that the flagbearer of the NPP also wishes the president well and expresses the hope that he will be back to do work in a few days time. That is a trap. What if the president doesn’t arrive in a few days time, then it deepens the speculation that he is so sick that he cannot return.
“People should look at the wording of the message, it is mischievous, it is calculated to feed into the public perception that the president is very sick.
“These are the methods which were used against the president in the 2008 elections. They did not work, the president won the elections. Those who are competing against the president should by now know if they were minded to think strategically and so on change their strategy. Unfortunately they are using the same strategies which caused them the 2008 elections, and if I were a member of the NPP, I will be very worried that the same methods which lost them the election are the same methods that they are using.
“In any case, who tells them that if the president dies today, they will win the election? It will rather make their task of defeating the NDC far more difficult than it is today because of the sympathy it will generate. So I don’t understand this jubilation about the death of the president, because it is not even in their interest and yet they don’t recognize it’’.
“There is not a single goodwill in that message, it is calculated to achieve a diabolical dent and it must be exposed for what it is,” Kwesi Pratt said.
