Rawlings Receives Award

PRESIDENT RAWLINGS RECEIVES AWARD FOR EXEMPLARY LEADERSHIP FROM STUDENTS OF LAGOS AND KADUNA STATE UNIVERSITIES

Former President Rawlings and his wife Nana Konadu Agyeman Rawlings were on Friday honoured for exhibiting exemplary leadership by a joint group of students from the Lagos and Kaduna State Universities in Nigeria.

The former President also took the opportunity to explain why he declined a national award describing the attempt as a ³smokescreen² by the current government to reward itself.

Led by Messrs Alfred John Ogbonna, Coordinator, and Anthony Corsy, Lecturer in Mass Communication at the Kaduna State University and leader of the team, the group presented the former First Couple with a glass plaque embossed with the insignia of the University of Lagos as a symbol of their appreciation of their inspiring leadership while they led.

Ogbonna who has Ghanaian parentage recounted the days when Ghanaians had to queue for basics such as kenkey and recounted how he was excited to see Ghanaians not having to queue for kenkey when he came back to Ghana a few years ago.

The event was held at the Ridge offices of the Former President and attended by leading members of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) including Chairman Dr Kwabena Adjei, Campaign Chairman, Alex Segbefia, MP for Ningo Prampram, Enoch Teye Mensah, Propaganda Secretary Fiifi Kwetey and former Presidential aspirant Edward Annan.

Receiving the award, President Rawlings said he and his wife were honoured and humbled by the recognition.

President Rawlings said: ³The continent of Africa is bedevilled with several problems, which we can quickly allude to colonisation. What we have however conveniently overlooked is the failure of our leaders to offer meaningful political direction required to move us forward.

³What you have done today by acknowledging what you believe is exemplary leadership on the part of my wife and I humbles us but will ironically and sadly serve as a source of derision by some people who cringe at the unquestionable fact that we left a positive legacy for this country and beyond.²

The former President explained that his eighteen years as leader of Ghana ³was achieved not by lording it over the populace but by understanding the needs of the average Ghanaian who had no voice to express his opinions - the rural folk, the downtrodden.²

³My wife Nana Konadu served as a bedrock traversing the entire country through her 31st December Women¹s Movement, empowering the women, identifying sources of economic and political empowerment for them and ensuring that the conservative mentality of women playing second fiddle in society was exorcised.

³Today the reward from the country she served and continues to serve is political persecution in legal disguise,² he lamented.

³A few years ago when the University of Development Studies in the Northern part of Ghana sort to recognise the vision of the PNDC/NDC government for the establishment of that University the current government had the temerity to block the ceremony from taking place. But when it was time for this government to reward itself they attempted to use me as a smokescreen by offering me an award. I politely turned it down.

³I travel to Nigeria regularly and you will be aware that recently I was honoured as an Honorary Partner of the River State Development Agency. They appreciated what the PNDC/NDC government had done for rural development in Ghana.

³Our acceptance of your award today should serve as an inspiration to you as young leaders of tomorrow. The challenge to you is a tough one as the world is teetering on the brink, with moral, economic and political woes created by leaders with no vision but myopic and parochial interests.

³As I mentioned earlier Africa has been led down the path of under-development by leadership that did not have the interests of the populace at heart.

³Things may have taken a turn for the better, but that can only be perpetuated by a new crop of leaders who are imbued with a sense of nationalism and patriotism and a desire to rise above the ashes of the past.

³The continent is so well endowed in natural and economic resource but it is a complete disaster that we cannot boast of development.

³As you set about recognising the quality of the leadership some of us have displayed you are enjoined to set higher standards as your turn arrives.

³If the colour of democracy is going to be allowed to change, what then happens to the quality of justice and freedom that we hold so dear to our hearts? What then happens to Morality and the Ethics of man? What happens to human dignity and civilization?

³Those who cannot see the changing colour of values are condemned to live this abnormality as normal whilst those of you who can see the changing colour are condemned to suffer the growing abnormality unless your integrity remains resolute and you become the agents of change by engaging in the prayer of action.

³You the youth especially more so than the older generation possess the capacity for change.

³There is so much to do to transform the lives of our people, the security of the health of families, the security of the right to development. But we cannot bring about this great change unless the Agents of Greed Oppression and Corruption are contained transformed or pushed aside.

³Corruption of any sort that goes unpunished and without remedy perpetuates itself and not only stunts National Growth and Civilized Development, but undermines the very stability of the nation state.²

Later in post-event interviews President Rawlings advised Ghanaians to use the NPP¹s own terminology in voting them out at the next election ­ Hwe wa asetena mu na to aba pa.

On why he declined the national award, he questioned whether President Kufuor had the moral fibre to present awards to he Rawlings or to himself having supervised the rape of Ghana.

Nana Konadu urged women to work their way up the leadership ladder and not to be concerned only with looking beautiful, explaining that it is as well their responsibility to provide direction in building better societies, as men.

She said if men were heads, women should consider themselves as necks that carry the heads and therefore should direct where the body goes.

Dr Kwabena Adjei recounted the difficult days Ghana found itself in the early 1980s, which sent a lot of Ghanaians including him to Nigera.

³I was compelled to leave Ghana to teach in a Nigerian University. When I came back to Ghana I recognised the efforts President Rawlings had made to change the country and accepted his invitation to serve the country.²

The party chairman said the leadership of President Rawlings and his team was a selfless one devoid of personal gain.

Alex Segbefia said he felt proud that students from another country had honoured the former President. He noted that Ghana was privileged to have produced two of the continents most iconic leaders, Dr Kwame Nkrumah and President Rawlings.

³Some countries have not been able to produce even one such leader but we are lucky to have two.²

Segbefia said Rawlings was special not because he did not have flaws but because when his positives were weighed against his negatives the positives far outweighed the negatives.

³We come from a proud political tradition and we are lucky to have President Rawlings as our founder.²