Konadu Agyemang Rawlings’s Unsuccessful Challenge

Before the recently concluded NDC congress, some of us argued that Mrs Konadu Agyemang Rawlings should be left free to challenge President Mills, if she wanted to, because it was her right to do so. Her challenge also showed that there are some women in Ghana who are ready to challenge men in our men-dominated world. Such a challenge is an indication that Ghana's democratic experiment is taking a “new leap”. Women are now asserting themselves, not only at Parliament and in the Judiciary, where women now lead, but also at the Executive level, where women in the past only used to play second fiddle to men. Irrespective of party affiliation, and also irrespective of any negative perceptions we individually hold against the Rawlingses, the former First Lady did what Ghana’s democracy needs. For that reason, [and that reason only], she has my respect.

Having said all this, I have to add that I never at any time before the congress inwardly expected Mrs Konadu Agyemang Rawlings to beat Atta Mills in an election that was not open to all members of NDC and where the grass-root, [from where the former First Couple derive their support], was not proportionately represented in the composition of the voting delegates. Those who backed Mrs Rawlings, in my opinion, did so as a way of registering their protest to the Mills Government, rather than as a means of removing him from the leadership of the party. This fact notwithstanding, Mrs Konadu Agyemang Rawlings, backed by her previously rowdy supporters led by FANKOR, has succeeded to prove two facts which are that..... ......

*(1) Professor Mills is not a good leader and that should explain why he, a sitting President, had to be challenged by a member of his party in attempt to stop him from running as the NDC’s flag-bearer in the 2012 elections and handing victory cheaply to NPP. That has showed that no future incumbent Ghanaian President should think that he or she has the right to represent his or her party for a second-term of office, irrespective of his or her performance in the first term. Ghanaians should and will remain grateful to Mrs Konadu Agyemang Rawlings for establishing this important Ghanaian democratic precedent which will certainly have future references and applications.

*(2) If one stands up and fights persistently for one’s human rights, one is sure to break through all hurdles and succeed to do what one has a right to do....... just as she, Mrs Konadu Agyemang Rawlings, firmly stood up against Professor Mills and his campaign network led by “GAME” that tried to thwart her inalienable right of challenge to His Excellency in the matter of the nomination and election of the 2012 NDC flag-bearership. Though she failed in her ultimate bid, because of the sheer weight of the incumbency factor in our part of the world, Mrs Rawlings succeeded to challenge the President and give him sleepless nights until the last day for the congress.

Now that the former First Lady has succeeded to challenge President Mills and has, thus, taught all future Ghanaian Presidents the lesson they should never forget, it is time for her and her husband to have a sober reflection of their positions and take stock of themselves, with a review to reappraising their political standing and public image. It would in fact help the Rawlingses to improve their social standing and public image, if not their political standing, if they took immediate steps to dispel the perception of selfishness and hypocrisy that they themselves have hung around their necks over the years and most especially recently.

*TOWARDS THIS END, THE FIRST LADY AND HER HUSBAND SHOULD BACK THE CAMPAIGN TO REMOVE THE INDEMNITY CLAUSES FROM OUR CONSTITUTION, SO THAT THOSE WHOSE HUMAN RIGHTS ARE BEING TRAMPLED UPON THROUGH THE UNNECESSARY ENTRENCHMENT OF THOSE PROVISIONS IN OUR CONSTITUTION CAN ALSO PURSUE THEIR HUMAN RIGHTS AND SEEK JUSTICE, IF THEY SO WISH, JUST AS MRS RAWLINGS WAS ALLOWED TO PURSUE HER RIGHTS AND THROW A CHALLENGE TO PRESIDENT MILLS IN ATTEPT TO DISLODGE HIM FROM THE 2012 NDC FLAG-BEARERSHIP.

We know that the First Couple have for years claimed to be “clean”. And nobody doubts their integrity, as long as there is no proven evidence to the contrary. As a “clean couple”, the Rawlingses have nothing to worry or fear about, concerning their past. We know that the Rawlingses have always shown eagerness to see that those behind past unresolved murders, such those behind the killing and decapitation of the former Yaa-Na some years back, are found, prosecuted, convicted and punished. And that this eagerness demonstrates the belief of the former First Couple in the principles of accountability and justice. As people who believe in these two noble principles, the Rawlingses, also, naturally believe in the two associated judicial principles of “the need for people who go to equity to go with clean hands” and “the need for those who seek equity to give equity”. By being the Head of State who inserted, or supervised the insertion of the Indemnity Clauses in the 1992 Constitution, Mr Rawlings has created the impression that there is something “dirty in his pocket” which he wants to hide from the public and yet he, Mr Rawlings, keeps asking for the alleged “wrong-doings” of Mr Kufuor and his administration to be investigated. By so behaving, Rawlings keeps contravening the judicial principle that says “those who go to equity must go with clean hands”. In other words, Rawlings displays absolute hypocrisy in his pursuit of administrative accountability and justice. Also, by failing to openly suggest, or back the removal of the Indemnity Clauses from the 1992 Constitution, Mr Rawlings has ditched the important judicial principle that says “those who seek equity must give equity”. Mr Rawlings who from time to time has been calling for extensive investigation to unearth the circumstances leading to the killing and decapitation of the former Ya-Na, has himself failed to accord Ghanaians such extensive investigation into the abduction and killing of the three High Court judges and an army officer that occurred during his administration, despite the fact during his tenure of office many Ghanaians asked for such investigation into these crimes which were speedily and shabbily investigated into and which unjustly led to the arrest, conviction and “eradication” of people that Ghanaians believed and still believe to have been killed so as to destroy the “witnesses” who were deployed as “messengers and executioners” acting on behalf of the “real culprits” who are now “free” and still living. Many Ghanaians still want proper investigation into those hideous crimes but cannot have it, because of the Indemnity Clauses.

If Mr Rawlings is “clean”, [and we have no cause to think otherwise]; if Mr Rawlings is not selfish and does everything he does for the good of the Ghanaian public only, [and we have no cause to think otherwise]; if Mr Rawlings really believes in the principles of accountability and justice, just as he keeps preaching them to us, [and we have no cause to think otherwise]....... then let him and his brave wife do what any couple of high public standing would do in the circumstance. Let the former First Couple renounce the continued insertion of the Indemnity Clauses in the 1992 Constitution, after nearly twenty years of their adoption; and let them join those of us who are calling for their immediate removal from our constitution by the Constitutional Review Commission that is yet to complete and submit its report. If Mr Rawlings who inserted, or supervised the insertion of “prohibitions” in the constitution and his brave wife were to call for the removal of the Indemnity Clauses, it would be much easier for the CRC to heed the huge public call for the clauses to go.

Let "Yaa Asantewaa" Konadu Agyemang Rawlings, [the woman who dared to challenge Mills when NDC members with “balls” in their “crossbars” could not do that because of fear or because of exigencies]; let JJ Rawlings, [the man who does not fear “huu”, and who thrice took up arms to overthrow the Government of Ghana]; let the former First Couple, one of two only still remaining; let them now do the decent thing by joining the campaign to remove the Indemnity Clauses from the constitution to give meaning to its preamble that underpins our collective Ghanaian faith in the principle of equality of all Ghanaians before the law. If the former First Couple joined the campaign to remove the Indemnity Clauses from the 1992 Constitution and declared this publicly, they would win the admiration of most Ghanaians, and from that time onwards many of us would see them as “genuine”, honest, selfless, patriotic and above all “believable”. If they failed to declare now their dislike for the continued retention of the Indemnity Clauses in the constitution, twenty years after their making and insertion, then the recent challenge of President Mills by Mrs Rawlings for the position of the flag-bearer of NDC in the 2012 election, together with the numerous calls by Mr Rawlings for members of the Kufuor administration to be thoroughly investigated to ensure accountability and justice, would be seen by many Ghanaians as an act of grotesque greed, selfishness, self-pontificating and hypocrisy; and would also be seen as part of their continuous efforts to control the nation’s governance, abuse public trust, contaminate justice and public accountability and strangulate Ghana’s harmonious and peaceful development.

Source: Otchere Darko; [This writer, {who is not the same as Gabby Otchere-Darko}, is a centrist, semi-liberalist, pragmatist, and an advocate for “inter-ethnic cooperation and unity”. He is an anti-corruption campaigner and a community-based development protagonist. He opposes the negative, corrupt, and domineering politics of NDC and NPP and actively campaigns for the development and strengthening of “third parties”. He is against “a two-party only” system of democracy {in Ghana}....... which, in practice, is what we have today].