It is an incontestable right of every President across the globe to hire and fire due to the executive powers entrusted in him or her by the Constitution. It is also true, and indeed, sanctioned in many democracies that Presidents are not obliged to proffer explanations for hiring or firing of any public official.
However, a creeping disturbing phenomenon in the Mahama-led administration, which needs the serious thoughts and attention of governance experts, civil society, media and gate-keepers of human rights, is the recent style of laying off appointees usually without recourse to their fundamental human rights and which is reminiscent of the dark days of the military dictatorship where impunity reigns.
Agreeably, it was to be expected that when President John Mahama took over as the first gentleman of the land, albeit the same political party, and like any president, he would want to change the face and the appearance of his government in that; it was not out of place to replace appointees of his mentor and predecessor, the late President Mills, with some new faces to inject freshness into his administration, but regrettably, the approach so far is not in tandem with best governance practice.
Recent lay-offs of some government appointees under this current regime leaves much to be desired, it reminds one of days of the military involvement in our body politics or when a civilian government wins an election and replaces another civilian regime, but from different political persuasion where carried-over public office holders were arbitrarily asked to proceed on indefinite leave usually, with-immediate-effect, then leading to their eventual dismissals.
In the past few days, official government communication confirmed the dismissal and or appointments of executives of some key state organizations among them include the Chief Executive Officers of the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation, Nana Boakye Asafo-Adjaye; the Volta River Authority, Mr. Kwaku Awotwe and Deputy Minister of Communications, Ms. Victoria Hammah.
Mr. Alex Mould, formerly of the National Petroleum Authority (NPA) and who has been replaced by Mr. Moses Asaga, has been re-assign to take over from Nana Boakye Asafo-Adjaye as the new GNPC boss whiles Kirk Coffie, Deputy Chief Executive of VRA takes over from his boss, Kwaku Awotwe, as acting CEO, and the sacking of deputy minister of Communications, Madam Victoria Hammah, following a leaked tape.
Ordinarily, as we stated earlier, there is nothing wrong with the President and government deciding to do away with certain persons and bringing others on board, but the mode and manner in which these people were relieved of their posts is very unfortunate and not of best administrative practices.
In the case of the immediate past Chief Executive of the GNPC, Nana Boakye Asafo-Adjaye, who was appointed by President Mahama’s predecessor John Mills after he was asked to “proceed on leave with immediate effect” by ex-president Kufuor’s administration in 2001, he was said to be busily behind his desk working when he heard of his dismissal announced through the media.
The Al-Hajj is utterly worried the Mahama-led administration has ‘treated’ a man who was first appointed to the same position by his party founder, President Jerry Rawlings’ NDC 2 administration, but was rudely and cruelly sacked by the former President Kufuor due to his political affiliation only to be brought back by the late President Mills; removed in this manner, a clear case of double jeopardy as the lawyers would say.
More worrying is the fact that at the time the Mahama administration was announcing Nana Boakye Asafo-Adjeye’s dismissal from office, his replacer, Mr. Alex Mould, then Chief Executive of NPA was outside the jurisdiction on official assignment in the name of the NPA and therefore was not physically present to take over his new post or even to hand-over his previous job, one may wonder what the exigency was that the appointing authorities couldn’t have waited for him to have returned during the almost two weeks he was away?
Then came the swift dismissal of the deputy minister of Communications, Victoria Hammah, who was caught on a purported tape among other things giving a rendition of how the First Lady, Madam Lordina Mahama influence appointments, how she (Victoria Hammah) planned of making $1 dollars in government before quitting thereof, and also opining that the government used the Minister of Gender and Social Protection, Lawyer Nana Oye Lithur to influence the Justices of the Supreme Court in deciding the election petition in favor of President Mahama.
Whiles The Al-Hajj upholds the President’s prerogative to proffer explanation for her dismissal, the swift manner the government announced her removal from office in a terse statement, and which has become a topic for discussion both in the media and social media platforms, it would have been more prudent if government had provided an explanation to clear all lingering doubts and also, to prove the young deputy minister has been given a fair hearing, which is an inalienable right.
More ominous of all the dismissals by the Mahama administration is the ousting of the Chief Executive of the VRA, Mr. Kwaku Awotwi, who is said to have eight more months for his contract to run out and who was leading a VRA/government of Ghana team to a conference in China only to be whispered to in the conference hall that he has been sacked.
Regrettably, it was Mr. Awotwi, who was virtually ‘begged’ by the late President John Mills to leave a very lucrative corporate world as Managing Director, Strategic Planning and New Business Development of Ashanti Goldfields Co. Ltd to take up the VRA job where he has managed to position and redefine the Authority to the extent that the protracted and unfortunate ‘dumsor dumsor’ menace is now a thing of the past.
The Al-Hajj believes that regardless of what might have occasioned for the government to decide to dispense with the services of any appointee it cannot work with and irrespective of any offences they may have involved in, to warrant their dismissal, they must be treated humanely and with dignity, even if they are ordinary shop-floor workers, best practices must be strictly adhered to.
In the case of Mr. Awotwi, we at the The Al-Hajj do not want to read political meanings as some are trying to, especially when President Mahama has publicly stated that he is ready to work with every Ghanaian irrespective of their political or social inclinations to move this country forward, but we are not discounting it though.
We are therefore calling on the President, John Dramani Mahama, to have another review of these recent reported cases of removing heads of organizations from office and subsequent ones to follow in order to maintain Ghana’s enviable shining star status so far as democracy in Africa is concern.
We are also calling on all civil society groups, the media, religious groups and all well-meaning Ghanaians to let their voices be heard to nib these festering ‘dictatorial’ tendencies in the bud. We have for a long time under flimsy excuses destroyed our fine brains and mother Ghana has continued to be the loser.
