Feature Article, by Nana Akyea Mensah, The Odikro.
A rejoinder to: Kwesi Pratt is a Foreign
Agent By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.
Maybe someone who knows better ought to tell Okoampa that "Wikileaks [are]
not the handiwork of ... a bona fide European citizen fed up with the
hypocritical political culture of Western government", but an Australian who
goes by the name of Julian Assange. It is also interesting that it is
Okoampa who is giving "a wake-up call to all those naïve Ghanaians who think
that flagitiously maligning our prominent leaders before foreign security
agents is the hallmark of patriotism"! I am grateful for the opportunity
that this presents to help expose him further to Ghanaians.
Notice how the "political officer" of the US Embassy has become "foreign
security agents". I am happy I have dealt already with the key word
"PROTECT" that was used as an excuse to confront the revelation that, "Nana
used to smoke a lot of marijuana, and I'm telling you, a lot. Even in the
morning, there used to be a cloud around him and you could see that he was
high". So I can now deal with the politics surrounding this.
WHAT IS THE MATTER?
I was so amused to read Jeremiah
Vandermeer
Culture's take on this:
"Of course, just because it's written in a Wikileak, doesn't mean it's true.
That hasn't stopped members of other political parities in Ghana from demanding
Akufo-Addo's take a drug test or
resign
I don't have a heck of a lot of sympathy for Akufo-Addo, who was the
Attorney-General and Minister of Justice from 2001 to 2003 under former
President John Kufuor. Marijuana is illegal in Ghana, as is
homosexuality
Laws like that could drive a man to smoke first thing in the morning."
As I write this, I am mindful of the fact that this is not something Kwesi
has confirmed or denied. He is insisting on sound journalistic principles
and right not to give a comment. He does not do a job Akufo-Addo is supposed
to do for himself, that is, to clear his name from all these drug
allegations and bring it to a closure.
"'In the interest of Nana Akufo-Addo himself, I think he has to bring this
speculation and all to a formal closure by using formal processes if he has
the confidence to bring this matter to an end. Because this will continue to
linger for a very long time. I am not the one to clear him.'
According to Pratt, he is guided by the journalistic ethic that information
obtained per privileged circumstances is not meant for public disclosure and
would therefore not answer questions of whether he said what has been
attributed to him of Nana Addo or not." See: "Pratt: Let Nana Addo clear his
'drugs' charge himself, not me", Myjoyonline, General News, Friday 9th
September, 2011.
What I find most fascinating is whether really there are that many people
who have not heard of Akufo-Addo's wee-smoking habit. And what exactly is
the secret we are talking about here. I have been wanting to say more on the
entire issue in WikiLeaks: Is Kwesi Pratt "Spying" On The
NPP?
(...A
Rejoinder to: Kwesi Pratt is A Double Agent -Wikileaks By Akwasi A. Afrifa
Akoto, Modern Ghana.com, Feature Article of Satuarday, 10 Sept, 2011.) but
it would have made it too long and a bit irrelevant to the technical issues
at stake. Okoampa gives me the exact opportunity I need to opine publicly on
the matter. And for this, I am sincerely grateful to Dr. Kwame
Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., of the Danquah Institute and wish to thank him.
Okoampa-watchers have also noticed his vulture attitude towards exposed fake
stories such as the witch-hunting of Mr. Tsatsu Tsikata in the Kufuor
Administration. On the issue of the "Rawlings Hit-List", I remember saying
to myself that if Okoampa does not write about this, it will be difficult
for the story to die. And lo, and behold, Okoampa wrote: And the story
died. And I was proved to be right. Thus reading from Okoampa's special
talent to gravitate towards dead political slimes in much the same way as
the vulture is to a carcass, I can safely predict that, with his take on it,
we have seen the end of this silly story.
This is why I was very pleased to see this particular article by Okoampa. It
came quicker than expected. I was not expecting Okoampa to sound the requiem
article on this ridiculous circus any time soon! I can already anticipate
with total contentment, the kind of comments Okoampa is going to elucidate
with this article. And as a street-wise citizen, I am certain that those
behind the plot to paint no other person but Comrade Kwesi Pratt, Jnr. as a
"foreign agent" must be feeling very frustrated by the way Kwame Okoampa
treated the subject, because it gives their game away!
I would be happy to see Okoampa humiliated to a point where, he would have
to be told to write sense or shut it, because more and more people in the
elephant family will begin to precipitate towards Alan Kyeremanteng and John
Kufour "Agenda 2016" and abandon the Akufo Addo "Victory 2012" team simply
because of Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr.! I know there is brisk movement and
under-currents going on, and a lot of public relations cinema and
make-beliefs to maintain the façade of party unity that both sides need.
Funny thing is that Okoampa behaves like a bull in a china shop and keep
destroying every single constructive job being done for his "uncle" by
thousands of dedicated supporters across the country. His insults of Ewes at
the slightest pretext, make him sound more of someone who is thinking more
of taking power by the force of arms rather than by the ballot box, and
showing people where power lies, and in particular, the significance of his
Akyem royal blood.
OKOAMPA'S LECTURE ON PATRIOTISM
For someone who knows what Kwame Okoampa is about in his prodigious
writings, the kind of desires and wishes he has expressed publicly, such as
his happiness about the claim to Ghana's territorial waters by Laurent
Gbagbo's government. The reason why he was happy was because Ivory Coast
will have our Jubilee Field! This is how much Okoampa loves Ghana.
In a feature article we even read Okoampa openly jubilating over the
prospect of war with the Ivory Coast, this time, on account of some bogus
claims by Laurent Gbagbo to our territorial integrity:
"I am glad that, finally, the Ivorians are beginning to assert their right
of access and enjoyment of Ghana's purportedly new-found oil wealth.
Perusing President John Mills' second and latest “State of the Nation
Address” the other day, I couldn't help but wonder aloud why Ghanaians seem
to be so morbidly afflicted with this kind of hysteria whereby the mere
announcement of a potential windfall is deafeningly celebrated even while
such “natural” largesse squarely remains on the prospector's drawing board.
It also didn't quite make a lot of sense to me that an oil find that lay so
dangerously close to Ghana's border with Côte d'Ivoire would also have been
so godlessly uncharitable as to neatly parcel itself out for the exclusive
benefit and enjoyment of Ghanaians while the war-seasoned Ivorians continued
to languish in penury." See: 'Who Are These “Parliamentarian
Drivers”?
by* *Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.,* *Feature Article, Mon, 15 Mar 2010.
So if such a person comes to tell Ghanaians that Kwesi Pratt is a threat to
the security of Ghana, shall we say he is saying this out of love for our
country? A very dangerous lunatic who sits in his ghetto in Bronx and writes
articles upon articles fanning inter-ethnic conflicts, and literally calling
for war in Ghana! (See: "The NPP Must Prepare for
War!
By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D., Feature Article | Thu, 07 Jun 2007).
And he is not a security risk! Okoampa is not a foreign agent! Even though
when it comes to issues such as the establishment of US Africa Command
Headquarters in Accra, and US military bases in Ghana, Okoampa is more
Catholic than the Pope! In "A
rejoinder:
Okoampa
Requires Immediate Psychiatric
Examination!"
Article by Nana Akyea Mensah, Thu, 05, Aug 2010, I stated:
"Even the planners of US Africom have since acknowledged that the initial
approach was a mistake!Okoampa did not mind whatever the Americans were
willing to ram down our throats! There he goes:
"In the lead-up to President George W. Bush's five-nation African
tour-of-duty," Okoampa laments, "the Director of Public Affairs at the
United States' Embassy in Accra was prompted to vehemently deny widespread
rumors and allegations regarding Mr. Bush's official visit to Ghana, from
February 19-21, climaxing with the bilateral ratification of an agreement
between the American leader and Ghana's President John Agyekum-Kufuor
allowing the establishment of an American military base in the country."
(See: U. S. Embassy has Absolutely Nothing to Deny!!!, by Kwame
Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D., Feature Article | Mon, 18 Feb 2008)
It must carefully be noted that even though Okoampa himself accepts and
welcomes "Mr. Bush's official visit to Ghana, from February 19-21", as
"climaxing with the bilateral ratification of an agreement between the
American leader and Ghana's President John Agyekum-Kufuor allowing the
establishment of an American military base in the country," for some very
strange reasons he still manages to refer to the opposition to these bases
as being based upon "vicious rumors and allegations"! "Allegations" that are
more or less his own!
"Indeed, one does not have to look far to conclude that such political
mischief is the incontrovertible brainchild of the so-called National
Democratic Congress (NDC), the pseudo-political party that militarily
occupied Ghana for nearly twenty years. Then also, this is not the first
time that the bugbear, or specter, of the establishment of a U. S. military
base is being bandied about. It is also significant to observe that the
NDC's ideological twin-sister, the so-called Convention People's Party
(CPP), has been in the thick of such vicious rumors and allegations." (See: U.
S. Embassy has Absolutely Nothing to
Deny!!!
by Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D., Feature Article | Mon, 18 Feb 2008)
Indeed when Kwesi Pratt blew the alarm about the US Africom and its
intentions to base its headquarters possibly in Ghana, the US Embassy came
out to deny the allegations. Kwame Okoampa is the only Ghanaian I know who
wrote a whole feature article supporting the Africom project at that time
and criticising the US Embassy for not owning up to the facts and going
ahead to publicly establish the bases!
Here is the guy who want to lecture Kwesi Pratt, Jnr., on "Patriotism" No
sane person can match such Chutzpah! It is more than obvious that the only
reason for which Kwame Okoampa would like to paint Kwesi black is because of
what Kwesi is reported to have said about his "uncle". And here, I think it
is pertinent to clarify what Kwesi actually said and not what people say he
said, both in the WikiLeaks and its aftermath. For the lack of space, I
shall limit this discussion on what was said in the document itself, and
hope for another opportunity to jump upon to discuss the rest.
THE REVELATIONS IN PERSPECTIVE
Perhaps, a little context will do. I have personally been around on a few
occasions in the early 1990s, where diplomats from various missions came to
see Mr. Pratt. It should be clearly understood that this is politics. I
fully endorsed and supported every single word Mr. Pratt uttered in my
presence to each of these diplomats. So the first thing to do is to see
things in context, because often, when you miss the underlying politics, you
miss everything.
So me as soon as I read the cable, I could not help myself from imagining a
scenario based upon my experience of working with Kwesi, several
possibilities behind those words. My favourite one was that Kwesi must have
known that the US was more inclined towards Akufo-Addo than his own
preferred candidate, Professor Mills. The individual who came to see Kwesi
is a political officer. That was his official title. So this was strictly
politics. It was a game of wits.
What the report may not tell or Kwesi might not have noticed are sometimes
the facial expressions of these well-trained diplomats, when they are being
openly told in a most dissuasive language possible, that they are betting on
the wrong horse. For, I think the political objective of Kwesi in such an
encounter is certainly not to give Akufo-Addo, a clean bill of health, even
though he did his best to tell the truth and to praise Akufo-Addo where
praise was due.
Rumours about Akufo Addo's use of drugs were already well-known to the
Americans. That is why they asked the question in the first place!
Everything Kwesi said was already an open secret. So what is important is
not even what he told the Americans but why said what he is reported to have
said. Notice that it was not Kwesi who brought this up. It was the political
officer who brought it up, because the Americans probably care not to be
associated with him, or measure their support, if the guy is openly known as
a junkie.
In circumstances like this, knowing very well the support of US
multinationals, and by that, the support of the US government for the
Akufo-Addo candidacy, as demonstrated at the Hyatt Hotel on the 4th of June
2008 in a secret luncheon at the Hyatt Hotel, Washington. organized by the
Whitaker Group, which was generally seen as an illegal fund-raising effort
against the laws of the United States and also against the laws in Ghana.
Mr. Pratt was probably dissuading through teasing the diplomat with
embarrassing facts, which must have been targeted to ridicule the US for
supporting a junkie! It could also influence US policy on the NPP candidate,
which was already favourable and mitigate their meddling.
And of course, "it is needless to say" to borrow from Okoampa, that, if I
had been present I would have laughed in a way that he would have known that
I was laughing at him diplomatically. Which means a full-hearted laugh with
a full-throated ease and contentment with the style Kwesi uses to tease the
imperialists with their junkie puppets! This is why I find Okoampa funny
when he is forced to project his own personality on someone he certainly
knows nothing about! Okoampa ridiculously writes:
"In the Akufo-Addo case, while some may well be tempted to invest Mr.
Pratt's allegation with some modicum of credibility, for the Insight's
managing-editor has, reportedly, had a long and intimate association with
Ghana's former Attorney-General and Minister of Justice in the Kufuor
government going back to the late 1970s and early 1980s, nonetheless, what
ought to be equally considered is the fact that a staggeringly naïve Mr.
Pratt appears to have been overly eager to ingratiate himself with the
anonymous American diplomat to whom the staunch Convention People's Party
operative let on supposedly confidential information on Akufo-Addo."
Here is someone who clearly has no idea what the Kwesi Pratt phenomenon is.
I am not too sure of exactly what happened, but I will make an intelligent
guess from several possibilities, and I think I can smell in the nose, a
distinct possibility. It is not like he is revealing state secrets. Indeed,
if Kwesi succeeded in convincing the Political Officer of the US Embassy
that Akufo-Addo is not a cocaine addict but a wee-smoker, is it not better
than the original accusation? Has he not moved Ghana forward? Cocaine and
wee, which one is more serious?
One thing I like about Kwesi is his personal honesty, decency, and ability
to speak the say his mind in a clear and responsible manner. The "evil" that
men say, live after them, "the good is oft interred with their bones", so
let it be with Kwesi! I have read this over and over again, and I think
Kwesi conducted himself very brilliantly and gentlemanly in the interview.
The reason why I am making this claim is because, like Kwesi, I also thought
of Akufo-Addo as being less corrupt than those figures around him. Kwesi
made a point of that, which I think was fair and honest on his part. As a
senior journalist and Managing Editor of a newspaper from an important
constituency of Ghana's democratic left, and a seasoned political activist
in his own right, he knows very well what to say and what not to say. It is
a combination of these, coupled with amazing flashes of insight, such as his
prediction of the fall of Rawlings in an Atta-Mills Administration that
attract all sorts of people to him like a powerful magnet.
Read carefully and come back and tell me whether or not Kwesi Pratt, Jnr.,
was really putting Nana Akufo-Addo down, apart from being honest and scoring
a diplomatic goal by teasing the Americans with their junkie albatross on
their necks, who can never convince a majority of Ghanaians to vote for him
as their President, simply because of his use of drugs! The secret Kwesi is
supposed to be saying happens to be something majority of Ghanaians who will
be voting against Akufo-Addo might be having on their minds as they vote!
I am sure Kwesi would not have volunteered the information if he had not
been asked about Akufo-Addo and the cocaine allegations in the press. Kwesi
clearly defended Akufo-Addo that he did not believe he had anything to do
with cocaine. You see, sometimes, when you are defending someone from a very
grave offence, you have to admit the minor ones. Kwesi said he did not
believe in the cocaine stories, but he knows that the guy loves the weed.
Which in a way exonerates Akufo-Addo from the very serious charges of
cocaine abuse!
The beauty of it is how Kwesi honestly assembles the facts, if the WikiLeaks
story is true, and triumphs in a brilliant coup diplomatique full of
political sarcasm.
GHANA ELECTION: POLITICAL PUNDIT PREDICTS NDC WIN
Begin quote:
¶3.
Pratt said that he has a long-standing personal relationship with both
Akufo-Addo and John Atta-Mills that goes back at least two decades. He felt
that Akufo-Addo had been unfairly tarnished by the assumption of corruption
because of the high-level positions he has held within the Kufuor
administration, but that he was in fact much cleaner than most of those
around him. Pratt has been a virulent critic of corruption in the Kufuor
government, which he labeled as 'astronomical" and "an affront to all
Ghanaians." The amounts of money being pocketed by public officials had
grown exponentially, he said, because of the discovery of oil and the
ever-increasing narcotics trade, but he posited that Akufo-Addo, in his role
as Foreign Minister in the second Kufuor administration, did not share in
the spoils. When questioned about persistent rumors of Akufo-Addo's own
cocaine habit, Pratt admitted that he had personal knowledge of the
candidate's drug use, but that it was not cocaine. "Nana used to smoke a lot
of marijuana," Pratt said, "and I'm telling you, a lot. Even in the morning,
there used to be a cloud around him and you could see that he was high. But
I never saw him do cocaine, and I think that is just an assumption people
made." WikiLeaks, Reference id 08ACCRA1509, Subject: Ghana Elections:
Political Pundit Predicts Ndc
Win,
http://wikileaks.org/cable/2008/11/08ACCRA1509.htm
End quote.
"IF YOU CAN NOT DEAL WITH THE TESTIMONY, DESTROY THE WITNESS" - a Danquah
tradition.
Okoampa uses the word "credibility" twice in his article:
Here he is worried that because of Mr. Pratt's credibility, people will tend
to believe his side of the story more than Akufo-Addo's:
"In the Akufo-Addo case, while some may well be tempted to invest Mr.
Pratt's allegation with some modicum of credibility, for the Insight's
managing-editor has, reportedly, had a long and intimate association with
Ghana's former Attorney-General and Minister of Justice in the Kufuor
government going back to the late 1970s and early 1980s..."
Here he sets out to destroy such credibility:
"The latter, of course, directly implies that Mr. Pratt's credibility is not
airtight or foolproof. One, we actually are in the dark vis-à-vis the exact
circumstances under which Mr. Pratt snitched on Nana Akufo-Addo, since the
former has clearly admitted to the act. In other words, did any gifts or
bribe money change hands?"
I happen to know that in the Danquah tradition, a trait which seems to have
survived the old man is "character assassination". Danquah perfected it into
a state of art during the trial of eight of his very close relatives who
were found guilty of the ritual murder of Nana Akyea Mensah, the Odikro of
Apedwa. His principal defence strategy was to discredit any decent, law
abiding citizen who happened to see or know anything concerning the crime.
He attempted, at the great cost of the Akyem state, to systematically
assassinate the character of all the witnesses in the case. Of course, the
fact that he failed and it continues to fail does not seem to convince these
Danquah adherent that it is a foolish strategy. Okoampa is being tragically
foolish as Danquah was in his time. That is why as soon as Okoampa appears,
everything begins to calm down. It takes a stupid public to peddle this type
of character assassination. And you fail, simply because, fortunately, the
public is not as stupid as Dr. Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D., really is!
Instead of dealing with the marijuana blues of his "uncle", Okoampa resorts
to invectives, name-calling, and character assassination, just as his
mentor, Dr. J. B. Danquah, had done before him. It is a tactic Okoampa is
very familiar with. He has even written about it concerning how Danquah used
it to destroy the witnesses to the case in which Nana Akyea Mensah was
believed to have been ritually murdered by eight of his own relatives. This
is Okoampa's own account of the silly tactic:
"Consequently, it appears that the first major, modern Ghanaian playwright
was forced by circumstances other than purely legal to proceed with his
Herculean role as a Defense Maestro or Conductor, for Danquah does not
appear to have personally mounted a spirited challenge against the
prosecution. And, indeed, as Rathbone wanly recalls: Danquah, who watched
the inquest proceedings which usefully rehearsed the prosecution evidence
for the defence as they were also implicitly commital proceedings, wrote to
the Okyenhene [- Nana Ofori-Atta II -] on 27 September 1944: The evidence
against the accused is very strong particularly the evidence of Botwe, Fosu,
Gyekye and Mireku. But I feel certain that very conclusive evidence is
available both at Kibi and in Ashanti against all these witnesses (Murder
And Politics 98; Ellipses appear in the original)." See: "The
EnduringLegacy Of Dr. J. B. Danquah PART 9",
Feature Article of Sunday, 8 May 2005, by **Okoampa-Ahoofe, Kwame.
If you cannot deal with the message, destroy the messenger. It did not work,
even though Danquah tried very hard to destroy the reputation of many decent
Ghanaians in order to save his brothers from the gallows! And it is not
going to work today, simply because it is Okoampa and not J. B. Danquah
doing a mischievous character assassination! I wish someone would be kind
enough to help this tormented soul wake up from his self-inflicted
nightmare, and smell the coffee!
It's Game Over!
*Forward Ever! Backwards Never!!!*
*Cheers!*
*Nana Akyea Mensah, The Odikro*
http://www.panafricanistinternational.org/
Pan-Africanist International - a grammar of Pan-Africanism and its manners
of articulation!*
*
**
*Twitter: http://twitter.com/TheOdikro*
*Feature Articles: http://nanaakyeamensah.blogspot.com/*
*Comments: http://theodikro.blogspot.com/*
