Nunoo Mensah cries over Mahama snub

Former National Security Advisor to former President Atta Mills, Brigadier-General (Rtd) Joseph Nunoo Mensah, has expressed disappointment at his inability to access President John Mahama.

His anxiety had stemmed from the claim that handlers of the president had prevented him from seeing the number one citizen of the land.

According to him, “On one occasion I had opportunity to meet the president but I didn’t even start talking when handlers of His Excellency the President said my time was up, and the door was opened for me to leave and honestly, I felt bad since that day.”

This revelation was made during an interview with the Al Haj newspaper.

“I want the president to give me a chance; I want to help him; I want to help the people; I want him to succeed;

I want to help reduce poverty and suffering of the people…I want the president to give me the opportunity to help reduce the deprivation in society,” Nunoo Mensah blurted.

Apart from that, the retired military General said he had also tried sending several text messages to President Mahama but was yet to get a response to any of them.

“Alhaji, I want you to tell the president that we can together change this country. All we need to do is to get the needed cooperation and support from the presidency,” he was quoted as saying.

Nunoo Mensah thinks his role as the man-in-charge of human security is not being recognised. The office is said to exist only on paper with virtually no budget and staff to carry out its functions.

The ex-military officer is not the only top man who had expressed a similar sentiment. There had been initial claims by the current majority leader and former member of the infamous ‘three wise men,’ Alban Sumani Bagbin, that the president was inaccessible to even senior members of the government.

After his open complaint, he was made the majority leader in Parliament.

At the time, he said “If you go round the ground, the statement people are making is that this is not a government of NDC.” Instead, he said the Mahama government was for “family and friends.”

He therefore stressed the need for the National Democratic Congress (NDC) to take over the running of the presidency because “it is the party that promised the people” and got him elected.

For him, since there were people who wrote the party’s manifesto and fought for John Mahama to become president, they ought to “be in charge of the governance of this country to make sure we implement the promises to the people. President Mahama cannot implement them alone.”