Exactly what Professor John Evans Atta-Mills means by asserting that the so-called National Democratic Congress (NDC) intends to put up a tough fight come Election 2008 is not clear (see Modernghana.com 12/26/07).
Does the preceding, for instance, mean that during the two previous presidential elections, in which the Rawlings second-bananas conceded defeat to the New Patriotic Party’s candidate for President, that, in reality, Professor Atta-Mills was merely engaged in a sheer game of pretence? Or that, perhaps, in the lead-up to Election 2008, the P/NDC intends to, as usual, intimidate the far more discerning Ghanaian electorate into, literally, throwing its destiny to the proverbial dogs?
What is clear, as witnessed from the hectic play-out, or drama, of the just-concluded 2007 Delegates Convention of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP), is the quite heartening and salutary fact of the Ghanaian electorate having moved far beyond the primitive politics of either raw intimidation or what the average Ghanaian has disdainfully designated as “Moneycracy,” or perhaps even more rhetorically aptly, “Lucrecracy.”
And here, it needs to be emphasized that Election 2008 stands to be squarely about an epic contest between progressive and constructive ideas, on the one hand, and the patently regressive politics of wistful personality cult, the kind of political agenda embarrassingly represented by both Dr. Paa Kwesi Nduom, of the rump-Convention People’s Party (CPP) and Professor Atta-Mills’ dictatorial, extortionate and criminally murderous National Democratic Congress, on the other hand.
And here also, perhaps it needs to be emphatically observed that Ghanaians are far, far less interested in Professor Atta-Mills’ so-called tough electoral fisticuffs than what each of the major participants of Election 2008 has to offer the country in the critical realms of economic growth and development, sound, efficient and readily accessible healthcare facilities and educational systems, transport and communication and the unfettered promotion and protection of the fundamental human rights of both private citizens and the society at large.
In sum, the former Legon law professor needs to be boldly and unreservedly reminded that Election 2008 is about neither a contest of personalities nor political parties, or even ideologies, but precisely what each of the various political factions, and/or their putative traditions, have both represented and contributed to either the development or regression of Ghanaian society. And on the latter score, we are afraid, the P/NDC, during the course of its 20-year stranglehold on the liberty and destiny of Ghanaians achieved practically nothing worthy of our discursive attention, as a body politic, or even individual scholars and historians.
Also, exactly what does the NDC candidate for president of Ghana mean by the following bluster, addressed in an interview to JOY-FM’s Mr. Israel Laryea: “The NDC[,] as usual[,] is going to be fair but tough and firm, but then would demand a level playing field”?
In brief, precisely what does Professor Atta-Mills mean by his NDC “demanding a level playing field”? And just about when did the NDC come to the sobering realization that it needs to demand a level playing field? And of what and from whom? The Ghanaian electorate, which twice roundly and flatly rejected Professor Atta-Mills? Or the ruling New Patriotic Party whose, largely, foresighted leadership continues to make Ghana the envy of the rest of democratic Africa and a beacon of hope for pseudo-democracies like Uganda and the Gambia?
In other words, what Professor Atta-Mills needs to do right now, if he is to have half a fighting chance against the sterling stewardship of the ruling New Patriotic Party, is to be able to explain in plain and simple language to the average Ghanaian voter precisely why after twenty years of putting Ghana into the humiliating receivership of a HIPIC nation, Ghanaian voters ought to, once again, entrust the so-called National Democratic Congress with their destiny.
Indeed, it goes without saying that it is precisely his withering inability to explain to Ghanaians, for example, why shit-bombing is to be preferred over the Akufo-Addo-minted Repeal of the Criminal Libel Law; or that the NDC’s Cash-and-Carry health policy is to be preferred over our NPP-initiated and welfare-oriented National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) that has condignly – or justifiably – consigned the perennial presidential ambition of Professor Atta-Mills into the dustbin of constant and invariably flat electoral rejection.
Interestingly and curiously, epic capital continues to be made about the one-term NDC vice-president purportedly being a man of peace and humility, rather than merely playing the tired role of good cop to Mr. Rawlings’ bad cop demeanor. And here, also, we recognize the dire need for Professor Atta-Mills and his supporters and cynical sympathizers to be frontally told that, indeed, “humble” people are self-respecting enough to appreciate the critical need not to continue thumbing their noses at the electorate once the latter has given them the boot or their well-deserved marching orders.
In other words, Professor Atta-Mills ought to find a different and altogether new line of work, or occupation, and stop arrogantly pretending as if he and the P/NDC are, somehow, entitled to dominate the Ghanaian political landscape in perpetuity by Manifest Destiny or divine right. Indeed, where I come from in Ghana, which is practically the entire motherland, there is a clinical term for the importunate behavior of Professor Atta-Mills; we call it “Quixotic Adventurism.” And it is rather pathetic for Professor Atta-Mills to be insisting that “2008 is the year for the NDC and the NDC is going to win.”
The foregoing is not exactly the measured language of an “Asomdwoehene.” Rather, it is the language of a narcissistic – or self-obsessed – lunatic. For the paradoxical implication here is that Elections 2000 and 2004 were not seasonable years for the P/NDC. If so, then why did Professor Atta-Mills and his P/NDC cronies fritter so much pelf in an attempt to winning these contests? Was it because these certified scam-artists felt it quite necessary to fool their supporters and also themselves into obtusely believing in the highly unlikely or even the outright impossible?
If so, then what sort of thinker or intellectual is Professor Atta-Mills, if not an unpardonably self-serving one?
Exactly what Professor John Evans Atta-Mills means by asserting that the so-called National Democratic Congress (NDC) intends to put up a tough fight come Election 2008 is not clear (see Modernghana.com 12/26/07).
Does the preceding, for instance, mean that during the two previous presidential elections, in which the Rawlings second-bananas conceded defeat to the New Patriotic Party’s candidate for President, that, in reality, Professor Atta-Mills was merely engaged in a sheer game of pretence? Or that, perhaps, in the lead-up to Election 2008, the P/NDC intends to, as usual, intimidate the far more discerning Ghanaian electorate into, literally, throwing its destiny to the proverbial dogs?
What is clear, as witnessed from the hectic play-out, or drama, of the just-concluded 2007 Delegates Convention of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP), is the quite heartening and salutary fact of the Ghanaian electorate having moved far beyond the primitive politics of either raw intimidation or what the average Ghanaian has disdainfully designated as “Moneycracy,” or perhaps even more rhetorically aptly, “Lucrecracy.”
And here, it needs to be emphasized that Election 2008 stands to be squarely about an epic contest between progressive and constructive ideas, on the one hand, and the patently regressive politics of wistful personality cult, the kind of political agenda embarrassingly represented by both Dr. Paa Kwesi Nduom, of the rump-Convention People’s Party (CPP) and Professor Atta-Mills’ dictatorial, extortionate and criminally murderous National Democratic Congress, on the other hand.
And here also, perhaps it needs to be emphatically observed that Ghanaians are far, far less interested in Professor Atta-Mills’ so-called tough electoral fisticuffs than what each of the major participants of Election 2008 has to offer the country in the critical realms of economic growth and development, sound, efficient and readily accessible healthcare facilities and educational systems, transport and communication and the unfettered promotion and protection of the fundamental human rights of both private citizens and the society at large.
In sum, the former Legon law professor needs to be boldly and unreservedly reminded that Election 2008 is about neither a contest of personalities nor political parties, or even ideologies, but precisely what each of the various political factions, and/or their putative traditions, have both represented and contributed to either the development or regression of Ghanaian society. And on the latter score, we are afraid, the P/NDC, during the course of its 20-year stranglehold on the liberty and destiny of Ghanaians achieved practically nothing worthy of our discursive attention, as a body politic, or even individual scholars and historians.
Also, exactly what does the NDC candidate for president of Ghana mean by the following bluster, addressed in an interview to JOY-FM’s Mr. Israel Laryea: “The NDC[,] as usual[,] is going to be fair but tough and firm, but then would demand a level playing field”?
In brief, precisely what does Professor Atta-Mills mean by his NDC “demanding a level playing field”? And just about when did the NDC come to the sobering realization that it needs to demand a level playing field? And of what and from whom? The Ghanaian electorate, which twice roundly and flatly rejected Professor Atta-Mills? Or the ruling New Patriotic Party whose, largely, foresighted leadership continues to make Ghana the envy of the rest of democratic Africa and a beacon of hope for pseudo-democracies like Uganda and the Gambia?
In other words, what Professor Atta-Mills needs to do right now, if he is to have half a fighting chance against the sterling stewardship of the ruling New Patriotic Party, is to be able to explain in plain and simple language to the average Ghanaian voter precisely why after twenty years of putting Ghana into the humiliating receivership of a HIPIC nation, Ghanaian voters ought to, once again, entrust the so-called National Democratic Congress with their destiny.
Indeed, it goes without saying that it is precisely his withering inability to explain to Ghanaians, for example, why shit-bombing is to be preferred over the Akufo-Addo-minted Repeal of the Criminal Libel Law; or that the NDC’s Cash-and-Carry health policy is to be preferred over our NPP-initiated and welfare-oriented National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) that has condignly – or justifiably – consigned the perennial presidential ambition of Professor Atta-Mills into the dustbin of constant and invariably flat electoral rejection.
Interestingly and curiously, epic capital continues to be made about the one-term NDC vice-president purportedly being a man of peace and humility, rather than merely playing the tired role of good cop to Mr. Rawlings’ bad cop demeanor. And here, also, we recognize the dire need for Professor Atta-Mills and his supporters and cynical sympathizers to be frontally told that, indeed, “humble” people are self-respecting enough to appreciate the critical need not to continue thumbing their noses at the electorate once the latter has given them the boot or their well-deserved marching orders.
In other words, Professor Atta-Mills ought to find a different and altogether new line of work, or occupation, and stop arrogantly pretending as if he and the P/NDC are, somehow, entitled to dominate the Ghanaian political landscape in perpetuity by Manifest Destiny or divine right. Indeed, where I come from in Ghana, which is practically the entire motherland, there is a clinical term for the importunate behavior of Professor Atta-Mills; we call it “Quixotic Adventurism.” And it is rather pathetic for Professor Atta-Mills to be insisting that “2008 is the year for the NDC and the NDC is going to win.”
The foregoing is not exactly the measured language of an “Asomdwoehene.” Rather, it is the language of a narcissistic – or self-obsessed – lunatic. For the paradoxical implication here is that Elections 2000 and 2004 were not seasonable years for the P/NDC. If so, then why did Professor Atta-Mills and his P/NDC cronies fritter so much pelf in an attempt to winning these contests? Was it because these certified scam-artists felt it quite necessary to fool their supporters and also themselves into obtusely believing in the highly unlikely or even the outright impossible?
If so, then what sort of thinker or intellectual is Professor Atta-Mills, if not an unpardonably self-serving one?
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