A Humble Mahama? What Joke Is That?

By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

Out on the hustings in the Volta Region on Monday, December 03, 2012, President John Dramani Mahama was reported to have prescribed for Ghanaian voters the qualities of the leader whom they ought to think of electing as their President this coming Friday. Among the qualities listed were “trustworthiness, respectfulness, peacefulness and humility” (See “Mahama: Ghana Does Not Need An Arrogant And Impatient Leader” Vibeghana.com).

Further, Mr. Mahama was quoted as follows: “Let me say that at this stage in Ghana’s history[,] the question we must ask ourselves is that [sic] what kind of leader we want [sic]. We don’t want an arrogant and an impatient leader.”

Maybe somebody ought to remind our Caretaker-President, per the credibly and impeccably documented evidence of former Attorney-General Martin A. B. K. Amidu, that his own boss, the late President John Evans Atta-Mills, found the now-President John Dramani Mahama so untrustworthy that he caused the establishment of a panel of high-powered investigators to look into the then-Vice-President Mahama’s possible embezzlement of public money earmarked for the purchase of six military aircraft. Now, let us talk about Chief-Shit-Bomber as a national security asset!

Anyway, Mr. Amidu has already published the names of the individual members who constituted the panel of investigators; and significantly, neither Mr. Mahama, the primary target of the alleged investigation, nor any of the three named expert investigators has come out to publicly contradict Mr. Amidu. So what is all this holier-than-thou talk about Mr. Mahama being more trustworthy than any of his seven other presidential challengers when, in fact, “Little Dramani” is widely known and credibly documented to be undoubtedly the most untrustworthy leader in Ghana’s postcolonial history?

Of course, nobody expected him to add “thievery” or “thief” to his list of qualities that make up the content of the character of the ideal Ghanaian leader, because this is exactly what and who the man is: a smooth-talking lecherous thief bereft of conscience!

Then also, what is so respectful, or even respectable, about him presuming to lecture Ghanaian voters to the invidious effect that about the only way for the main opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) to win the hearts and votes of northern Ghanaians would be for the flagbearer of the NPP, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo who, in the words of President Mahama, is a southern Ghanaian-born “Kabonga,” to resign his presidential candidacy and handover his leadership mantle to Dr. Mahammadu Bawumia, the vice-presidential candidate of the NPP, who is of northern Ghanaian descent, so as to enable the latter face-off against the Bole-Bamboi-born Mr. Mahama?

In other words, for a pathological ethnic and regional chauvinist like President Mahama to be self-righteously accusing his most formidable political opponent of arrogance constitutes the height of absurdity. It also unforgivably insults the intelligence of the Ghanaian voter.

And when he rather imperiously opines about “this stage of Ghana’s history” not desiring an “arrogant and an impatient leader,” about the most logical response to offer him is Mr. Mahama’s own abject desperation for power that has pathetically turned him into an expedient and Machiavellian distributor of Toyota Land Cruisers to key members of the National House of Chiefs, thus unconstitutionally and shamelessly attempting to devalue the age-honored institution of chieftaincy. Then again, what is so humble about a leader who cavalierly presumes to insult the intelligence of our traditional and organically invested rulers with bribery?

And when he vacuously asserts that “We don’t want a leader who would shed blood for elections; what we need is a peaceful leader and above all a leader who will bring Ghanaians together,” it becomes hilariously clear that Mr. Mahama must be living on his own custom-created planet.

Needless to say, on the question of political bloodshed, maybe somebody ought to remind Mr. Mahama that the founding-father of the National Democratic Congress is Chairman Jerry John Rawlings, and not Mahatma Gandhi or Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

You see, among the people where I come from in Ghana, there is this temper tantrum-dampening maxim: “If Mister Naked promises you a bolt of wax-print (or cloth), you just listen to his name.”

The fact of the matter is that Caretaker-President John Dramani Mahama has absolutely nothing short of overweening pride and vaulting presidential ambition to offer Ghanaians. About his only achievement, so far, is the curious construction of his so-called Presidential Cemetery at Geese Park in Osu-Accra. An elitist Chinese-constructed mausoleum, the Mahama Presidential Cemetery is meant to glorify the “revolutionary” thieves, fraudsters and greedy bastards of the so-called National Democratic Congress.

You see, when you can’t be buried among your sires in Bole-Bamboi, you definitely do not deserve to live among us, let alone presume to lead us; this is a sheer matter of common sense and cultural edict.

*Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

Department of English

Nassau Community College of SUNY

Garden City, New York

Dec. 3, 2012

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