By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.
Garden City, New York
Nov. 3, 2015
E-mail: okoampaahoofe@optimum.net
Whoever has been advising the indefinitely suspended National Chairman of Ghana’s main opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) is not helping Mr. Paul Afoko in any remarkable way. This is because ever since he was suspended, Mr. Afoko has attempted to use all available channels to get the decision of the NPP-National Executive Committee rescinded, except the most legitimate and relevant ones established by the New Patriotic Party. Which may stand to complicate matters for the man who unsuccessfully attempted to cop an alibi for his younger brother, Gregory Afoko, in the wake of the brutal acid-dousing assassination of the former Upper-East Regional Chairman of the New Patriotic Party, Mr. Adams Mahama, in May of this year.
In taking his case directly to the law courts, long before he has exhausted himself of all the channels established by the party for addressing grievances like his own, Mr. Afoko has clearly acted ultra vires, and thus more than amply demonstrated that he has absolutely no respect for the leadership of the party he was elected to serve. What this means is that Mr. Afoko has effectively burned up all his proverbial bridges. Consequently, even if he were given his job back by a court of law, he may almost immediately discover to his utter chagrin that he has absolutely nobody at party headquarters, other than his lock-step buddy and alienated NPP General-Secretary, Mr. Kwabena Agyei Agyepong, to work with.
But on this score, too, it goes without saying that when it comes to administering the affairs of the country’s largest political party, it definitely takes more than two to tango. Mr. Agyepong, himself, by attempting to publicly and unwisely impugn the authority and integrity of the NPP-NEC, has practically rendered his position with the party decidedly irrelevant. And it is only a matter of time before he also finds himself in the same boat of ostracism as his former boss. Very likely, the court before which Mr. Afoko is appealing his indefinite suspension will dismiss his case and refer him back to the NPP in order to have matters amicably resolved. This is because absolutely no court of the land has the right or jurisdiction to dictate how the affairs of any political party is to be run, short of determining whether in deciding to indefinitely suspend the former NPP National Chairman, the party’s National Executive Committee violated any of the standing rules established by the party for taking disciplinary measures against any offending operative.
Anyway, as was to be expected, there has been quite a bit of factional brick-batting since Mr. Afoko was suspended by a unanimous NPP-NEC decision a fortnight ago. The preceding notwithstanding, even as Akufo-Addo Campaign Chairman/Director Mr. Peter Mac Manu recently intimated, “all the national executives of the party are in support of the decision by the National Executive Committee to suspend their national chairman.” In other words, the indefinite suspension of Chairman Afoko is more a matter of principle than it is personal. Which further implies that the decision has far more to do with the general administrative performance of the man than it is about anything else.
Then also, adamantly insisting that he is still Chairman of the NPP, even before his case has been decided by a legitimately constituted court of law, may well indicate the fact that Mr. Afoko may finally and healthily be getting over his initial phase of denial into full acceptance of the inevitable, that is, the fact that he is highly unlikely to regain his position as Chief NPP Administrator, for at least as long as Messrs. Akufo-Addo and Bawumia occupy the positions of NPP Flagbearer and Running-Mate, respectively. Already, both men have unreservedly endorsed the decision of the NPP-NEC. Mr. Afoko had better come to terms with the fact that he cannot impose either himself or his will on the New Patriotic Party. It is as simple as that.
