Ablakwa Must Cut His Childish Teeth

*By Akadu Ntiriwa Mensema, Ph. D.

**The family of the late Emmanuel Owusu Ansah, an NPP MP, must call Samuel Okudzeto

Ablakwa to order for mocking and politicizing the death of their beloved one.

“A Deputy Minister of Information, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, has indicated that the

death of former Ashanti Regional Minister and MP for Kwabre West, Emmanuel Asamoah

Owusu Ansah, was the result of rumours that President Mills was dead. [Ablakwa]

linked rumours about the president’s death to the opposition NPP [and] stressed that

Mr. Owusu Ansah, an NPP MP died because his party had alleged that President Mills

was dead” (Ghanaweb June 26, 2012).

“A tape recording has been circulating in the media with a voice purported to be

that of the NDC National Chairman [Dr. Kwabena Adjei] claiming that people close to

and at the Castle were responsible for planning and executing rumours of the

President’s death for their own selfish agenda. Reactions from within the NDC and

without have been swift with some condemning him for the statements while others

have expressed their disbelief that the voice is authentic” (Ghanaweb June 29,

2012).

Okudzeto-Ablakwa

He

Who

Has not

Cut his teeth

Says stupid things

He whose teeth are not cut

He

Who

Has

Big rabbit-teeth

Teeth that break all

Glass of experience

Glass of courtesy

Glass of respect

Glass of dignity

Ah! Gargantuan teeth

One tooth looks west

One tooth looks east

Long parting teeth

Uncut parting teeth

Makes parting shot

At the dearly departed

Parting shot at the dead

Teeth that have bruised Mills

Teeth that mock Owusu Ansah

Teeth that politicize the dead

NDC don’t blame NPP

NDC should blame NDC

Blame Spio-Gabrah

The man who spews

Spewed that Mills was ill

Trumpeted Mills’ illness

NDC publicized Mills’ illness

Publicized at NDC Convention

Then NDC pawned Mills’ illness

Today it is for public sympathy

To demonize the NPP

To criminalize Akufo-Addo

To mock the dead NPP MP

Ablakwa the boy

Who bares his teeth

His Gargantuan teeth

Like a Keta School Boy

Gasping for breath

Double-pronged teeth

Pronging his teeth in public

With its grating noise

Cacophonous noise

Grating noise

Ah! teeth at war

Teeth-clashing violence

Ablakwa the boy

Who never cut his teeth

Has never cut his teeth

Not in childhood

Not in boyhood

Now cuts politics

Big teeth

That pries peace

Political neophyte

Political parvenu

Like Keta school boy

On the beach

Gasping for air

Showing big teeth

Double-pronged teeth

Gargantuan teeth

That plunges into it all

Into inexperience

Into stupidity

Into banality

Into divisiveness

These boys

Boys who drown all

Who have drowned Mills

Oh! Simpa Atta Mills

In a turbulent current

In Ablakwa’s large mouth

Where uncut teeth rules

Rules a servile tongue

*Akadu Ntiriwa Mensema, Ph. D., is a nationalist Denkyira beauty. She is a trained

oral historian cum sociologist and Professor in the USA. She lives in Pennsylvania

with her great mentor and teaches Africa-area studies at a college in Maryland. In

her pastime, she writes what critics have called “populist hyperbolic, satirical”

poetry. She can be reached at akadumensema@yahoo.com My poems and essays on Ghanaweb

and elsewhere must not be reproduced in full or in part for any academic or

scholarly work without my written permission.