One reason I like the NPP is their campaign and propaganda ability. They always turn any situation in their favor by just repeatedly twisting the argument to suit their course. They have the intellectuals who are good communicators and they use them. The problem is that most of the time, they always assume that because their leadership believes in the propaganda, most Ghanaians also believe that. As a result, they go into an election with the false surety of the support of Ghanaians and they fail. The leadership behaves like bus drivers who find themselves driving articulated trucks. What do I mean? In buses, the head is fused to the body and turns with the body. In articulated trucks, any time they have to negotiate a curve or a turn in an event, the head points one way and the body the other way.
Since Nana Akuffo Addo announced his intension to seek the flagbearership of the party for the 2016 elections, the very people who were accusing Professor Atta Mills of being too old even in his sixties are now saying that age is good for Nana. Why? Because he is their likely nominee and they have to turn everything in his favor in the eyes of the people. In other words, this whole age thing is pure propaganda and has no bearing on good leadership.
What I know is that, Nana Akuffo Addo has been in political leadership since the white men came. He has virtually contested the flagbearership of the party more than any member in history. He won it two times but failed to win the general elections on both occasions. He was a Cabinet member for the Kuffour government for eight years. In other words, there is nothing new about Nana Akuffo Addo in the minds and hearts of Ghanaian. He is just a recycled old politician who never says die until the bones are rotten.
What Ghana needs now is a set of new political leaders and this will come from the youth. We just don’t want a leader who will maintain the status quo. We need new and progressive ideas that will revolutionize the way we do things in Ghana, and that will not come from somebody like Akuffo Addo. It will come from the youth.
The youth of Ghana have struggled for existence in regimes of both Rawlings military and civilian governments, NPP’s Kuffour/Nana Addo government and Atta Mills/Mahama NDC government. None of which did them any good. As a result, they are more likely to call themselves independent than their elders and will work with groups from other political parties for the benefit of the nation. They are avid internet users and are abreast with events all over the world. They are more progressive in their thinking and most importantly, they are rebels. Their views favor activist governments but not a “Yes Sirising” one. A character a President of Ghana will need to face up to the marauding multinational corporations that are stealing our resources and the governments of the developed countries that act with impunity in Africa.
This young generation of adults has travelled a lot and has experienced interactions with diverse nationalities and has gained the most optimism about this country. That comes despite the economic difficulties that a large share of them have experienced since entering the workforce. And it stands in contrast with some previous generations. They hate the current abysmal situation of Ghana and are desperate to succeed. This is the same situation that produced some of the best leaders in the world and in Ghana such as Kwame Nkrumah and Jerry John Rawlings.
The youth are much much less tribalistic than the octogenarians and are likely to be more inclusive than the present old generation. A youthful president of Ghana will use every available human resource to solve problems no matter what party affiliation it belongs to. This is the future of Ghana.
So far what we have had in Ghana is the leadership from the old sector of the privilege class of Ghanaian society. Akuffo Addo and Mahama have not struggled before. They are all Dadda mma who have been pushed to leadership positions in spite of some of their positives. Akuffo Addo is a royal whose father was the President when he was even a kid. The over pampering shows in his life. His sense of entitlement, his failed education in Britain and in Ghana and his supposed drug use. Mahama’s father was one of the privilege members of society during Nkrumah’s time and despite his gentility, that shows in his style of government.
Contrast that to Kwame Nkrumah. He was a son of single mother and a stow-away who found himself in America without a visa and legal papers. He struggled to survive and to gain his Masters degree. Through that he gained understanding of the exploitative American system and how it affected Ghana. What did he do? He joined the civil rights movement of Dubois, Freeman and Marcus Garvey. When he was brought to Ghana he was way ahead of the rich upper class leadership of the independence movement led by J. B. Danquah and Paa Grant. Thank God he was not for an independence that just called for a change in national flags and anthem but a change in the life of the people of Ghana. It is told that Danquah never won an election in Kyebi despite calling himself the Doyen of Ghana politics. That shows how far he was not in sync with his own people.
Take the case of Jerry John Rawlings. A vagabond rebel and a struggler who despised the conditions imposed on the country by senior military officers and political leaders. Despite all his problems, he put his life on the line to initiate a change in the course of the country that has led to the most democratic dispensation any country has experience in Africa. No other regime has involved the youth of this country in governance than the AFRC/PNDC/NDC. For more than ten years after he handed over, not a single corruption charge has been filed against him and has become the most famous and incorrigible political fighter in the country. Both Akuffo Addo and Mahama tried to win his support during the 2012 elections and he entertained them all despite their political differences.
The last point is that Ghana needs a knowledgeable, progressive and charismatic leader. I want a leader who will let me stop whatever I am doing to listen to him. The one I will walk on foot for several miles on empty stomach to meet and listen to. The one who talks like he knows me personally. The one I will want to share a beer or apio with. The one whose ideas will make you cry and die for your country. The one who can move me. Such a person can mobilize the broad sector of the Ghanaian society of action independent of political affiliations. I am tired of the unprogressive politics of insults and those who use them to gain power and I am tired of the same old men who think they are my saviours.
I want a leader who knows what is happening in the world right now. I don’t mean wars in Ukraine or Somalia. I mean social networking. The one who blogs and chats with friends all over the world. The one who has IPhone, tablets or laptop. I mean the current man who knows what is going on in the world, who talks technology and drones. Such a leader will abhor schools under trees and ankofem and tweaa politics, will not rely on prayers and all-night vigil to solve political and currency problems and will not depend on all die be die to win political power. We have these people in both political parties. What we need is for these recycled old men to give way for the new breed of progressive leaders. Ghana is not that desperate to rely on the same dynasty for our salvation. We know what they stand for and know that they have nothing new to offer but division, litigations and love for power.
We thank Akuffo Addo and his old generation for their contribution but it now time for them to move on. They should retire in peace so we can consult them if the need arises. We are tired of the democratic Eyedamas and Mogabes of Ghana. “The old order changeth, yielding place to new, and God fulfils Himself in many ways, lest one good custom should corrupt the world” (Alfred Tennyson 1809 – 1892). Nana Addo akyi aya.
Kwame Yeboah
gyeboah@harding.edu
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