Lunacy Is A Family Affair, Mr. Baako

By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

Ordinarily, I would not be wading into this fracas regarding that insolent butterball who, literally, made an epic mess of his job as CEO of the Volta River Authority (VRA). But since I was one of those who predicted that this horse-gone-crazy was likely to shortly pay dearly for his presumptuously cynical attempt to railroad the Akufo-Addo Revolution, and thus criminally undermine Ghana's fledgling democratic culture, I feel compelled to put into the piggybank my proverbial five cents or nickel.

I would also have let this largely oafish self-preening exercise in futility slide by because as I have reminded my readers time and again, I am not even a card-carrying member of Ghana's main opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP). I lasted only seven months as a member until the Edweso/Ejisu Cabal decided to give me the heave-ho, simply because I had dared to criticize, albeit rather mildly and politely, their Sacred Cow. For me, though, it was a simple but necessary act of good faith. I have since not regretted my candid carpeting of the retired Big Kahuna one bit; and, of course, there is a palpable reason for this immediately below.

Needless to say, those who have been studiously following the raging political crisis in both the country and within the New Patriotic Party, ought to be fully aware, by now, of the fact that we are still harvesting the carcinogenic seedlings planted by some of the bigwigs of the NPP since the immediate lead-up to Election 2008. There is, therefore, absolutely no need for me, at this time, to rake over the proverbial old wounds.

What I can, however, observe here without any fear of contradiction is that the subject and individual being staunchly defended by Mr. Abdul Malik Kweku Baako is not indispensable to the ideological afflatus - or inspirational font - for the foundation and/or establishment of the New Patriotic Party; and neither are his political misadventures and/or gross ineptitude to be envisaged as being virtually synonymous with the erstwhile Kufuor-led government of the New Patriotic Party. Needless to say, the subject in question was appointed VRA's CEO as an individual and thus ought to bear full responsibility for his dismal performance and widely perceived wanton profligacy at both the latter post and also as the organizer of the infamous Ghana@50 disaster.

What is significant here to also observe is that the Kufuor-led New Patriotic Party, like previous counterparts in this country, was not a government staffed with angels or saints; rather, like its predecessors, the Kufuor-led NPP had its fair share of foibles and other forms of human failures and weaknesses. Ultimately, though, it is the balance sheet of the good, foresighted and perennially constructive, and indubitably progressive, that ought to be measured against the patently dysfunctional and even abjectly regressive.

And on the preceding score, the Kufuor administration has no competitor in our Fourth-Republican dispensation. That it marked unarguably one of the most democratic epochs in Ghana's postcolonial history is definitely beyond debate. At any rate, the fact that the individual under discussion was summarily relieved of his post by the very personality who appointed him CEO of the VRA, ought to put paid to any foolhardy attempt and/or temptation to defend him.

Not very many employees who endured his rag-tag executive leadership have fond memories of that chaotic period and the man. In other words, pretending as if the individual in question is, somehow, larger than life itself or, by logical extension, more important or greater than the NPP itself, is tantamount to nothing short of the unpardonably absurd.

As of this writing (6/1/13), for instance, it was being widely reported that the fast-aging Mr. Butterball had been suspended from the New Patriotic Party. I, personally, believe that he ought to have been summarily expelled, since in recent weeks he has shamelessly and publicly demonstrated that he is more willing to go to bat for President John Dramani Mahama than amicably and harmoniously work with key operatives of the NPP, in order to strengthen the latter legendary democratic political organization for the greater and long-term good of Ghana.

Of course, Mr. Butterball has every right to insist on his membership of the NPP; but his actions are indisputably telling of one who is inexorably determined to run the party aground, if he cannot hijack it and transform it into his private beast of burden. Madness, it has been said, is a veritable familial product. In brief, if Mr. McNasty Butterball thinks he has a bounden right to foist his evidently nihilistic tendencies on a party and a people whose only crime is to have made him prominent on the national political landscape, he must be the biggest fool in big-time Ghanaian political culture.

Better yet, if he feels a little spacey or even cranky, let his family members take care of their kinsman!

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*Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

Department of English

Nassau Community College of SUNY

Garden City, New York June 1, 2013 E-mail: okoampaahoofe@optimum.net ###