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Election 2020: Arise Ghana youth for your country - Part II

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Wed, 11 Nov 2020 Source: Abdul Hakeem Iddrisu

Fellow youngsters of the Republic of Ghana, “politicians and diapers”, they say, “have one thing in common, they must both be changed regularly and for the same reason.”

I am back to continue with episode two of the epistle I began two weeks ago subject to the above caption. And if I may proceed with a quick recap and summary of the last episode. In that piece last two weeks, I attempted to point out how the New Patriotic Party, under the leadership of President Akufo-Addo, while in opposition, may have been the main architect behind the struggle and pain of Ghanaians during the one term of former President Mahama in respect of the Economic Policy prescribed by the IMF, and the Dumsor crisis which I believed was being sabotaged so that Akufo-Addo could win.

Because it was a promise by President Akufo-Addo and the NPP, out of desperation, to make the Mahama’s administration ungovernable so that Ghanaians could vote out His Excellency former President Mahama.

And I was asking rather rhetorical questions whether were they also coming to govern if they decided to make another president’s administration ungovernable, knowing full well the implication on Ghanaians?

I concluded that their titanic quest to run the country went beyond the welfare and wellbeing of Ghanaians, it was simply an avenue to milk the people of Ghana dry and that has spoken volumes in the National debt they are leaving behind after four years in office!

In fact, I must confess that I did not come back with the Part Two last week because I was really waiting for the United States of America, the modern-day cradle of democracy, to set the pace for Ghana before I continue with my patriotic call on the young people of this country to rise against the NPP government that has made shortchanging of Ghanaians a pastime.

And “Alhamdulillah”, I feel like a million. The USA election went well to the jubilation of the entire world. The Americans demonstrated that no president can hurt them without their permission judging from the landslide victory they gave Joe Biden.

The onus now lies upon us, as Ghanaians, to borrow their example by breaking the myth of the so-called conventional or rather compulsory two terms for every political party in power come December 7.

According to Mark Twain, “Loyalty to the country always, but loyalty to government (political party) when it deserves it.”

And there is every evidence that President Akufo-Addo and his largest government do not mean well for us, and we must not be loyal to them.

For four years, that god-forsaken entity called New Patriotic Party as a government, remained a huge home for official gangsterism, a classic form of “create-loot-and-share” the like of which we have never witnessed in our lives before as a people.

To set the record straight, permit me to admit that the USA election and the victory of Joe Biden in particular, mean a lot to us here in Ghana.

Like former president John Dramani Mahama, Joe Biden has been mocked and told he was only going to embarrass himself in the contest and that it was over for him. His political antagonists and detractors told him point-blank, that the best position he could garner in the election would be fourth if not worse.

But what God almighty has ordained, no man can asunder.

President Mahama has also been mocked and told all kinds of things in this country, and he had once been a victim of the deadly jabs of my pen because I was also one of the majority of Ghanaians who were deceived to believe he was the last thing Ghana needs. I am very sorry, and Ghanaians are sorry, daddy. You were indeed a true father of the nation.

The “Exchange Rate of time and patience and tolerance have exposed the shenanigans of the NPP.

At a certain point, like Joe Biden, the NPP branded president Mahama as a palm wine tapper, a certain cattle-heading northerner who did not even go to school and who mismanaged our economy because he borrowed forty billion in four years; because 1 dollar was not equal to 1 Cedi but 3.5 Cedis under his watch.

How many cedis is equivalent to one dollar today? How much has been added to our national debt today? What is the Corruption Perception and Reality Index today in Ghana?

Our elders say when two people are fighting, let both explain their side of the story before you place your thumb on who to blame.

The majority of us did not give president Mahama the chance to explain his side of the story. Today, the NPP has done that for him by the unprecedented damage done to the country! And by the grace of God, like Joe Biden, former president Mahama shall also win this contest.

There are some “useful idiots” who are still under the optical illusion that the USA election has no impact or correlation to the upcoming general elections in Ghana. Really?

Let the deniers deny but I say to them that what happened in the USA will have its replica in Ghana. Only fools can fail to see the handwriting on the wall of destiny.

The Asantes, like New Yorkers, know when to vote for one of their own and when to sit on the fence and observe voter apathy at least, or vote a different candidate, because the enemies of your enemies are your friends! Akufo Addo is the enemy in this election. The man has been seriously marching to the beat of his own drums. He hardly considers others in his decision-making. It has always been “Me Too” if not “Me First”.

In this election, however, I am not asking fellow Ghanaians to copy the example of the USA blindly by electing our own “Democrat Party” in Ghana because the Democrat of America has been elected to govern; I am not asking you to elect former president Mahama because former vice president Joseph Biden has been off the seat, like Mahama, and got elected into office again.

I am not asking right thinking and clean-minded Ghanaians to vote for the National Democratic Congress because it is the only major political party with a female running mate Prof. Jane Naana Opoku Agyemang, like the USA’s Kamala Harris, for the first time in our history.

Fellow Ghanaians, I am calling upon you to vote against president Akufo Addo like Americans did to Donald Trump, because the reason why Donald Trump lost his job as president, Akufo Addo has been a disaster and a worse offender of it.

I am not imploring Ghanaians to vote for Mr. Mahama because of the USA election, but to help retrieve our money stolen by ATM and “food is ready” politicians who, under the guise of kickbacks, undertook fraudulent flagship projects due to personal greed; I am asking you to vote for Mahama to rescue Ghana from the reckless borrowing that the borrowers will never be around to contribute to pay.

Fellow Ghanaians, we must not allow the children and grandchildren of those present at the helm of affairs to tell us one day, as their parents did, that they have never suffered in their lives before and may have to board “Trotro” to feel and share in our agonies because their parents stole enough of our commonwealth in arrears for them and got away scot-free. It is tearfully painful!

Please, be informed that president Akufo Addo has borrowed over ten thousand Ghana Cedis (10,000) on behalf of every Ghanaian.

That’s how much his government costs every Ghanaian: sick or dying, poor or rich, old or young, toddler or adolescent, King or subject etc.

For every Tom Dick and Harry in Ghana, an amount of 10,000 Ghana cedis has been borrowed on your behalf. Note that revenues accrued from say, Cocoa, Gold, Crude Oil, Taxes, by the government in the last four years on our behalf which must have been literally shared among us were the government not going to use it for so-called developmental projects, is not included in this debt!

I am calling on Ghanaians to get Akufo Addo out of the Flagstaff House come December 7 because the man is a retailer of incompetence, a great deal of it.

He is only competent at depleting our national kitty; grandfather Akufo Addo is only competent at management and supervision of corruption, unfathomable size of it. President Akufo Addo is not an honest manager of public wealth and people; like Trump, he is unfit as commander-in-chief of the Ghana Armed Forces, he is a defender-in-chief of Delta and Invincible Forces; he is not a unifier as we think, he is a divider-in-chief of not only his political party but the very unity of this country! I hope Dagbon knows this. Let nobody fall for the “crumps” this time around.

Donald Trump, according to many citizens of the USA, was very unfit for the presidency because of the tons of embarrassments he heaped upon that great nation due to the numerous scandals that rocked his administration and person. We all witnessed his impeachment process.

For four years Donald Trump remained an embodiment of shame to the good people of America and the Oval Office – from peddling lies about issues, payment of porn-stars to remain mute about alleged adultery he committed with them to alienating the allies of the USA but embracement of dictators and sworn enemies of the West.

His trade war against China has not been won and the accompanying financial casualties have been acutely devastating and left a colossal negative impact on his own people. Yet, President Donald Trump according to his people never ceases to brag about his smartness and competence, a trait he shares with Akufo-Addo.

(Sources: Trevor Noah’s Daily Show, the First 2020 presidential Debate, in PA Governor’s Speech)

Fellow Ghanaians, our minds are still fresh about the continental embarrassment that greeted Ghana during the inaugural ceremony of President Akufo-Addo.

Appreciate that when Socrates said, “employ your time greatly to read the writings of other men so that you shall come easily by what others have labored for” he never meant digitally lifting others’ works but to use them as a guide to creating yours.

One of Donald Trump’s governmental sins that angered the American people to show him the exit out of the White House is that Donald Trump took their National Debt Stock from 19.5 billion dollars to 26.5 billion dollars.

Fellow Ghanaians, Akufo-Addo ballooned our National Debt Stock from 122 billion to over 280-something billion Ghana Cedis in less than four years.

The biggest problem is not even about such reckless borrowing but the reckless evaporation and disappearance of the money from the economy. Because, if the money was used to undertake projects, that means it had been used to pay workers working in these projects across the country. Yet, there is no trace of that money in the Ghanaian economy. Where is it?

Fellow Ghanaians, I am asking you to rise against the battering and literal rape of your country. As the American election, this election in Ghana is of crucial importance because our future is at stake! It is a battle for the very soul of our dear nation that has been bleeding profusely if I may paraphrase one of the slogans by President-elect – Joe Biden. I am calling on Ghanaians to bring back President Mahama, In Shaa Allah, to help us uncover the mystery behind the spending of two million Ghana Cedis COVID-19 funds, daily, on Kenkey or Banku alone for several weeks. How?

To save ourselves from eternal slavery of having to work forever to pay debts we never benefited from, we must vote out president Akufo-Addo so that a new government can quickly trace the loots and the looters before we are stolen constitutionally after another four years is done.

At this juncture of our national humiliation and suffering (at the entrance of HIPC), we need a “faulty” but honest man and not a faultlessly dishonest Angel, to lead us. One of the striking differences between former president Mahama and Akufo Addo is that Mahama agrees to be a human who makes mistakes and always seeks another chance to correct himself.

On the other hand, Akufo-Addo admits to no mistakes; it is always someone else’s problem. He is an angel if not deputy God whose “flawless commandments” must always be swallowed hook-line-and-sinker in spite of the obvious.

The man portraits himself as a Sacred Cow when it comes to making mistakes! Akufo Addo is one of the men Groucho Marx was referring to when he said that, “there is one way to find out if a man is honest; ask him! If he says yes you know he's crooked.” And Thomas Eddison said that, “show me a thoroughly SATISFIED man and I will show you a failure.”

Flawless Akufo Addo has failed Ghanaians and has no businesses whatsoever to keep occupying the Flag Staff House and increasing our national debt stock he would never participate in its payment.

Had it not been the rubber-stamp nature of our Parliament House president Akufo Addo must have been impeached at least for his name appearing in Anas Arimeyaw Anas’s NUMBER 12 or he being “misled” by a Minister into signing an Energy document that was of cutthroat consequences to the people of Ghana (the Ameri Power Deal) or the BOST or the Agyapa Royal Deal etc. scandals. Indeed, “nearly all men can stand adversity,” says Abraham Lincoln, “but if you want to test a man's character, give him power.”

If President Akufo-Addo did not become the president of Ghana, we have blamed ourselves for the death of missing the opportunity to rescue Ghana from the so-called economic quagmire under former president Mahama. Thank God Ghanaians really tried him: the man is nothing but a huge disappointment.

Fellow youngsters, according to Abraham Lincoln, no matter how tall your grandfather was, you have to do your own growing. Our destiny is in our own hands in this election. Let’s rise to the challenge of marauding leadership.

Congratulations to Joe Biden and Kamala Harris president and vice president-elect of the United States of America.

For John Dramani Mahama and Prof. Jane Opoku-Agyemang, I encourage and motivate them with what Mahatma Gandhi is quoted to have said, “first they ignore you; then they laugh at you; then they fight you; then you win!”

Ghanaians owe you a re-election apology, and victory, In Shaa Allah, shall be yours! It shall be ours.

For those of us who were innocently deceived into questioning your competence and credibility by the placebo government of Akufo Addo, we say we are sorry. Indeed, your saboteurs will never be successful!

God Bless Ghana.

Long Live Us All.

Columnist: Abdul Hakeem Iddrisu