Showing posts with label NPP. Show all posts
Showing posts with label NPP. Show all posts

Thursday, January 19, 2012

Richard Mahoney On Danquah's CIA Connections – Part One

Richard Mahoney On Danquah's CIA Connections – Part One

Feature Article by Nana Akyea Mensah, The Odikro.


A Rejoinder to: Richard Mahoney: On Danquah and Nkrumah – Parts One, Feature Article of Wednesday, 14 December 2011, by Okoampa-Ahoofe, Kwame


For those of you who might not be following the politics of this debate, let me give a quick background to it. Dr. J. B. Danquah is considered “the doyen” of Gold Coast politics by the NPP in general, and particularly, by his handful of hard-core followers, mostly his blood relations, who also appear to be clearly and discernibly seeking to take advantage of his over-blown hero-status as a platform to launch their own personal political ambitions. Prominent among that group is Nana Addo Danquah Akufo-Addo, Danquah's nephew and flag-bearer of the NPP, one such politician who has firmly hinged his overall political campaign strategy as a continuation of the promotion of the ideals and values of what J.B. Danquah represented. His speech announcing his intention to contest the presidency attests to this campaign packaging. More importantly, he even established the Danquah Institute, pushing his own nephew and a grandson of Danquah, Mr. Otchere-Darko, then Managing Editor of the Statesman to man it.


Akufo-Addo was hoping to ride on the back of Danquah's fame to the Presidency. Things seemed to go smoothly for some time, particularly when NPP was in power, and external funders of right-wing think-tanks have never been difficult to obtain. The growing public awareness of the scandal involving human sacrifice and ritual murder in which Danquah was more than a mere defence attorney led the first body-blow to the carefully crafted image of a “gentle Danquah, meek and mild”, instead of the shameless accomplice to a ritual murder and human sacrifice! The Danquah followers have already been having a hard time with this scandal involving the ritual murder of Nana Akyea Mensah, the Odikro of Apedwa in February 1944, which is beginning to be widely known. Thus an additional scandal exposing such a villain as a CIA agent is another body blow to the propaganda materials they have been churning out about Danquah as a selfless patriot and so on, for obvious reasons.


An exposure of Danquah as a CIA agent, is exactly the kind of thing the Akufo-Addo campaign can ill afford at this time. It throws the entire Akufo-Addo campaign, carefully planned over the years completely out of gear. This explains the deep sense of alarm we saw live on TV when the CIA status of Danquah was revealed by Dr. Boamah Omane. It was quickly understood that after having tied his fate to “the doyen of Gold Coast politics”, J. B. Danquah's fall from grace to grass cannot take place without some of the political consequences washing on the fortunes of Akufo-Addo in the context of the current electoral campaign. Suspicions have already been raised by the links between “all die be die” and the US Africa Command, with what Otchere-Darko calls “Washington’s strategy of working with its regional allies in West Africa to develop relationships that will secure its energy security in the long term.” See: “Obama’s Visit – What’s In It For Us And U.S.?”, by Otchere-Darko, Gabby Asare, Feature Article of Monday, 25 May 2009.


Even though Otchere-Darko's performance was a complete flop, he obviously had very little room to manoeuvre with lies. Let's face it, how can they possibly challenge Richard Mahoney when Okoampa himself is saying: “One source which the followers of Mr. Nkrumah, the so-called Nkrumaists, have consistently, persistently and perennially cited to cast both doubt and aspersions on the integrity of Dr. Danquah is Richard D. Mahoney’s quite authoritative treatise on United States’ foreign policy vis-à-vis Africa during the Eisenhower and the Kennedy years, titled JFK: Ordeal in Africa (New York: Oxford UP, 1983). But that the author’s father, William P. Mahoney, was the U.S. Ambassador to Ghana during the Kennedy years, has predictably served to further enhance the credibility and authority of his book in the opinion of these diehard Nkrumaists.”? See: “Richard Mahoney: On Danquah and Nkrumah – Part One" by Okoampa-Ahoofe, Kwame, Feature Article of Wednesday, 14 December 2011. It is clearly a losing battle here. Perhaps this explains why Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe is so keen even to flog the dead horse with irrelevant tales! Perhaps he is being fooled by the Churchillian definition of success as “the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm”!


The incontrovertible fact that has remained equally unassailable to all attempts by Akufo-Addo handlers has been the revelation that point clearly to J.B. Danquah's involvement with the US Central Intelligence Agency, (CIA). The sad thing about this revelation is that the Akufo-Addo team appear to be fully aware of the damaging implications not only on Danquah's image, but also on Akufo-Addo's own political career, but appear to be caught off-guard and helpless. Their number one problem is that the facts are true, and they do not seem to have any intelligent response. It was simply disgusting to see Otchere-Darko going into tantrums at the mere mention of this on TV, and remaining conspicuously silent particularly after an article I wrote, J. B. Danquah Was A CIA Asset!” Feature Article of Saturday, 1 October 2011, by Mensah, Nana Akyea. Otchere-Darko kept silent. I followed it up with “Ochere-Darko Must Render Proper Apologies For 'Stupid' Insults!” Again there was dead silence. I wrote a Part Two and made sure that Otchere-Darko had a copy by e-mail. It was a shrivelled and completely flattened Otchere-Darko who responded:


gabby@danquahinstitute.org via srs.bis7.eu.blackberry.com to me, 12/10/2011.
Re: nanaakyeamensah@gmail.com has shared: Ochere-Darko Must Render Proper Apologies For “Stupid” Insults! Part II
Thank you. Most thoughtful!
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone from Vodafone”


That was all. Your guess is as good as mine as to what explains such an inexplicable climb down. Qanawu, of all people, refused to “talk and die”! He has since been avoiding the topic like a plague! He knows in his own bones that there is no antidote to facts, and the best solution is to avoid the topic entirely. Which is understandable, even though it leaves the Akufo-Addo campaign politically orphaned and stranded in the wilderness of exposure of what they are capable of. Considering the facts, silence is perhaps the best solution to this problem. It is therefore clear that if Okoampa-Ahoofe had consulted Otchere-Darko before writing his article, Otchere-Darko would have told him to “let sleeping dogs lie”. But that is certainly the kind of advice Okoampa would misconstrue as an irritating indication of a lack of confidence in his ability to re-write history in his capacity as an Associate Professor of English, Journalism and Creative Writing at Nassau Community College of the State University of New York, Garden City.


The funny thing here is that Okoampa probably thinks he is helping Akufo-Addo! I have often maintained, Okoampa always reminds me of the Roman general who said, I more fear a stupid ally than I fear a clever enemy”. With the Executive Director of the Danquah Institute on the run, it came as no surprise that Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., would naturally step in to save the situation. What we need to make clear is the fact that we know that there is hardly a Danquah follower who did not know that Danquah was a CIA agent, even though they would vehemently deny it in public, just as Danquah himself did in his time. The only hitch this time is that both in terms of content and author, they are finding it impossible to challenge Richard Mahoney's assertions that J. B. Danquah's family received CIA stipends when he was in prison. We are dealing with people who would ask you for the receipts to prove that the CIA was paying any money to Danquah. Thus, it is exceptionally fortuitous that the facts and the evidence came from a completely unexpected source.


It has not been easy since 1958 to lay hands on the hard evidence to categorically link and nail Danquah as a CIA agent, even though it was very clear to the Ghanaian intelligence that he was up to something. As Paul Lee explains in “Documents Expose the first evidence that emerged were anecdotal:


While charges of U.S. involvement are not new, support for them was lacking until 1978, when anecdotal evidence was provided from an unlikely source - a former CIA case officer, John Stockwell, who reported first-hand testimony in his memoir, In Search of Enemies: A CIA Story.


'The inside story came to me,' Stockwell wrote, 'from an egotistical friend, who had been chief of the [CIA] station in Accra [Ghana] at the time.' (Stockwell was stationed one country away in the Ivory Coast.)


Subsequent investigations by The New York Times and Covert Action Information Bulletin identified the station chief as Howard T. Banes, who operated undercover as a political officer in the U.S. Embassy.”


And perhaps that would have been all we would have ever known had Richard Mahoney not published his book. In 2002, John R. Stockwell, a former CIA officer who became a critic of United States government policies after serving in the Agency for thirteen years serving seven tours of duty explains in an interview:


“Howard Banes who was the CIA station chief in Accra engineered the overthrow of Kwame Nkrumah. Now, obviously, you can look at it in different ways. A Ghanaian might say I thought we did it. Inside the CIA, though, it was quite clear. Howard Banes had a double promotion and an Intelligence Star for having overthrown Kwame Nkrumah in Ghana.


The magic of it, what made it so exciting for the CIA, was that Howard Banes had had enough imagination and drive to run the operation without ever documenting what he was doing, and to sweep along his bosses in such a way, they knew what he was doing, tacitly they approved, but there wasn't one shred of paper that he generated that would nail the CIA hierarchy as being responsible.”


As Dr. Kwame Botwe-Asamoah, puts it:


Danquah’s detention under the PDA resulted from his involvements in coup plots in collaboration with the CIA. During the first treason trial of Awhiatey-Amponsah-Apaloo conspiracy of November 1958, after the passage of the PDA, J. B. Danquah was heard assuring a foreign diplomat that Nkrumah’s government would be overthrown in December 1958 (Bing). But the security forces did not act on it. They kept close eyes on him and other enemies of the State in order to gather hard evidence.” See: "Fallacies of J. B. Danquah's Heroic Legacy (V)", Feature Article of Monday, 25 September 2006 Columnist: Botwe-Asamoah, Kwame Dr.


For those of us looking for evidence of “receipts” of CIA payments to Danquah before we can be convinced that J.B. Danquah was indeed a CIA asset, the “receipt” came in the form of a book. As we can see from Okoampa's accounts, Richard Mahoney was no admirer of Kwame Nkrumah, and he was obviously not writing to please Pan-Africanists, when he noted that:


“The matter concerned Dr. J. B. Danquah, Nkrumah's opponent in the Presidential elections of 1960, who had been released from prison a few months after Mahoney's arrival as ambassador. Danquah paid a visit one November day to the embassy to ask Mahoney why the funds his family had been receiving during his imprisonment had been cut off after his release.


This was the first time Mahoney had heard of the arrangement. After Danquah left, he summoned the CIA chief of station to ask why he had not been advised by the agency's association with Danquah. Dissatisfied with the explanation, Mahoney flew to Washington two days later and personally informed Kennedy about the matter.” Read from page 184-185.


As I noted earlier in “J. B. Danquah Was A CIA Asset!”, Feature Article of Saturday, 1 October 2011 Columnist: Mensah, Nana Akyea:


The story in the book, “JFK: Ordeal in Africa”, is very clear. According to Richard Mahoney, Danquah’s collaboration with the CIA became clear when he went to the US Embassy, after Nkrumah had pardon Danquah and other detainees on June 2, 1962, to ask “why the funds his family had been receiving during his imprisonment had been cut after his release.” As Dr. Kwame Botwe-Asamoah, correctly recounts, “This caused Mr. Mahoney, the new US Ambassador to Ghana to summon “the CIA chief of station to ask why he had not been advised of the agency’s association with Danquah.” Displeased with the explanation, “Mahoney flew to Washington two days later and personally informed Kennedy about the matter” (Mahoney)." - Feature Article of Monday, 25 September 2006, Columnist: Botwe-Asamoah, Kwame Dr., Fallacies of J. B. Danquah's Heroic Legacy (V)”.


I think there is no easy way to deny a fact that is published by an authoritative source, but Okoampa's pathetic attempts to beat about the bush only helps Ghanaians to focus more on what he wants to divert our attention from. An ugly tactic that did not go down well was the attempt by Otchere-Darko to use insults and “takashi” or “all die be die” in response to these allegations. Since the event happened live on radio and TV programme on Joy FM and Multi TV, most Ghanaians did see, and most would easily recall the disgraceful manner the Executive Director of the Danquah Institute put up in the course of the discussion on the Founder's Day, last September. It was pathetic. Mr. Kweku Baako was talking about the need for a broad political consensus across Ghana's political spectrum.


“That will dilute the whole thing.” Dr. Omane-Boamah would not agree. In supporting his claim, he insisted that it would be wrong to include former “CIA agents like Dr. J. Danquah” as a founder of Ghana. It is precisely at this point that Otchere-Darko's misbehaviour began:


“Would you stop this stupidity?” Gabby asked angrily. “Would you stop this stupidity? Why is he so stupid? You are sitting here and accusing somebody of being a CIA agent, what sort of stupidity is that? What is this stupidity? This is stupidity… you consider a founder of Ghana as a CIA agent, what sort of stupidity is this? ...this is pure stupidity.”


Gabby Otchere Darko was then asked by the host of the show to apologize to listeners and Dr. Omane Boamah for the insulting language but Gabby would only apologize to listeners. He stubbornly refused to apologize to the deputy Minister. He rather chose the option of walking out of the studio than to apologize for the insults. He was subsequently asked to leave the studios for his refusal to apologize to Omane Boamah, since that was the rule. Gabby Otchere Darko accepted the option of not apologizing and walking out to apologize and stay, and walked off the live program stating:


“When you want us to have an intellectual programme like this, you don't bring people like this. I am not going to apologize, I can apologize to the viewers and listeners but not him. He insults J.B. Danquah and you want me to apologize to him? …I am not going to do that. Why should I do that? … If that is what you want I will walk out on your programme, I won't do it!”


I remember the reaction of Ekow Nelson: “Okoampa and Otchere-Darko are getting overly emotional about the wrong side of this issue. they are arguing that JB Danquah did not need any motivation from a foreign government to destabilize and overthrow the elected government of Ghana. He did what the CIA would have liked him to do but took no money for it! He did all of that pro bono! So why is that redeeming for Dr. Danquah?” And here was my own: “The only way out I saw for Gabby in this predicament was to have honestly admitted the fact that the CIA paid stipends to J.B. Danquah's wife whilst in prison, explained why this was so, and to have left the public in peace to go and find out for themselves! He could then have added, as he seems to explain so eloquently with his “friend of America” excuses, that even if Danquah was a CIA agent, he did it for the good of the nation but not for stipends. And he could have allowed the public to judge for themselves who is really stupid!” See: "Ochere-Darko Must Render Proper Apologies For “Stupid” Insults! Part I", by Nana Akyea Mensah, Featured Articles | 7 October 2011.


Even Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe was embarrassed enough to confess that the reaction of the Executive Director of the Danquah Institute, Gabriel Asare Ochere-Darko, to the allegations that “Danquah was a CIA agent”, was a "rather startlingly infantile reaction", even though he agrees with him! See: "Omane-Boamah Deserved that Bit of It", Feature Article of Friday, 30 September 2011. So I was completely taken aback, and could not believe my eyes at first, when I saw an article by Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., on this topic. But even more shocking than the fool-hardy idea of commenting on what has apparently been declared “a lost battle” and is fast becoming a taboo topic in the Akufo-Addo campaign, is the manner with which he beats about the bush and begs the simple question of whether or not J. B. Danquah was a CIA spy!


What Ghanaians want to know are the facts. Did J.B. Danquah go to the US Ambassador to ask why the CIA had stopped paying stipends to his wife? That is the question! Okoampa should stop beating about the bush and tell us why the CIA was paying these "stipends" in question to his hero's wife when he was in prison! Did J.B. Danquah go to see the then US Ambassador to Ghana, after Nkrumah had pardoned him and other detainees on June 2, 1962, to ask “why the funds his family had been receiving during his imprisonment had been cut after his release”? If you claim you read the book, then you ought to know that this very line is also in the book: “why the funds his family had been receiving during his imprisonment had been cut after his release”?


Grandson, let's talk about that. Let's talk about that, Baby!


Forward Ever! Backwards Never!!!


Nana Akyea Mensah, The Odikro, is a member of the Social Media Outreach Programme of the Pan-Africanist International - a grammar of Pan-Africanism and its manners of articulation! And is also known to Kwame Okoampa, the notorious assassin of character, as: "Ali Masmadi Sasabonsam Jehu Shoaboni Appiah, who now presumptuously and conveniently goes by the name of Nana Akyea-Mensah, the name of a historic man the likes of whose dignity and ineffable cynosure that SOB would never encounter among the male members of his largely pathologically skirt-chasing and pedophiliac family." See: A Typical Ghanaian Prophet, Feature Article | Thu, 21 Jul 2011, by Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

Monday, December 26, 2011

On Nana Akufo-Addo & The Wailers



By Nana Akyea Mensah



Over the past couple of years, watching the countless spins and puerile campaign initiatives by Nana Akufo-Addo and his cheer-leaders, I have had the occasion to be reminded of Sir Walter Scott's “children” who “build statues of snow and weep to see them melt.” One feature of these bands of Akufo-Addo followers that is very difficult to get used to, is the fact that they are equally as noisy when they are building their statues as is their wailing, when these also begin to melt. This article is intended to bring the noise down to acceptable decibels. One of the most notorious of the Akufo-Addo “wailers”, Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., a typical Akyem town-crier, whose “talents” include the ability to wail exactly like a baby, is under focus. 

In the lead up to the 2008 general elections, it was pathetic to see Okoampa-Ahoofe taking a free-ride on the Akufo-Addo campaign-hype of “one-touch” victory, even though the NPP flag-bearer had been left in no doubt by Professor Larry Gibson concerning his own chances of winning against the then NDC candidate, Professor John Evans Atta-Mills. Thanks to the revelations in Dr. Arthur Kennedy's book, “Chasing the elephant into the bush”, we now know that even as Akufo-Addo was stubbornly refusing to concede defeat to the winning candidate, as expected of any decent politician, Akufo-Addo was already aware he stood no chance of winning the race in the first place! 

The prognosis of his impending defeat did not stop him from using “one-touch” as his campaign slogan. It did not stop him from refusing to concede his obvious defeat. Akufo-Addo is therefore, himself, the spider at the centre of the yarn of lies being spun by the “wailers” around him, like Okoampa-Ahoofe. Akufo-Addo therefore needs to be dealt with in his own right, except that one of his wailers has developed some Dutch courage to disturb the peace of late, hence this focus on Okoampa-Ahoofe together with his uncle. Out of sheer desperation, and realization that Akufo-Addo is increasingly becoming the under-dog in the race, they are busy preparing the grounds to subvert the will of the people against their inevitable defeat at the 2012 polls.

I think two articles written by Okoampa-Ahoofe epitomize the phenomenon. In the first article, The Tribal Question: Why Akufo-Addo Must Handily Win the Ewe, Okoampa predicts a massive win for his uncle in the Volta Region in these terms, “Anyway, we know that Nana Akufo-Addo will handily win the Ewe vote in Election 2008, because the New Patriotic Party Presidential Candidate has guts and mettle for the fearless pursuit of unfettered democratic culture, whereas the nauseatingly timid Prof. Atta-Mills has always toadied up to the orgiastic butchery and immitigable savagery of the Dzelukope Mafia.” (See: The Tribal Question: Why Akufo-Addo Must Handily Win the Ewe, By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D., ModernGhana.com, Featured Articles, 9 October 2008).

In the second article, Okoampa-Ahoofe is busily instructing the winning candidate and President-elect, Professor John Evans Atta-Mills, to concede defeat to his losing uncle! See: “Atta-Mills Must Concede Defeat!By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D., ModernGhana.com, Featured Articles, 31 December 2008. So there is nothing new about these wailers, and their “all-die-be-die” because “someone is desperate to cheat us” nonsense. The Busia-Danquah fraternity have never lost an election without crying foul. This they did, even when their own colonial Britain was overseeing the 1951 elections, jailing Nkrumah during the campaigns and financing them! 
 
Try to find out how the Accra Sports stadium came into being, and you would be learning something about how the colonialists financed Danquah's initiative to use sports to attract the teaming Accra youth rallying behind Kwame Nkrumah They even cried foul after the 1951 elections when their own colonial patrons were in charge and had an obvious preference to them than to Kwame Nkrumah and his CPP! 
 
Before the 2008 elections, even Akufo-Addo's own private pollsters predicted an Atta-Mills victory. The attempts to stem the tide with the Rawlings' Hitlist hoax only worsened matters, as President Mills emerged not only victorious but also to be “his own man”. On the other hand, Akufo-Addo's popularity, insufficient as it was in 2008, has been on the wane, as a result of reckless statements and a series of drug-related scandals and allegations. 
 
As though that were not enough, his own lieutenants are at each others' throats. Herbert Krapa fights Otchere-Darko, Okoampa fights Ochere-Darko and Krapa, Otchere-darko fights Okoampa and Herbert Krapa. Even within the inner-circle of the so-called “Victory 2012 Campaign”, the constant strategic repositioning and jostling for power and attention has led to a complete breakdown of teamwork. It is even worse with the NPP as a party. Today, despite the obvious low-profile, the “Agenda 2016” is almost becoming a household word. The funniest thing about Okoampa-Ahoofe is that he even helped in putting words to the fundamental logic that has now developed into the full-blown “Agenda 2016”:

"...the fact that the timing of his premiership had far more to do with the widely perceived success of the suggested candidate than either his own proven managerial skills or his perceived ability to readily reach out to his internal political opponents..." - Okoampa-Ahoofe, Kwame. See: NPP Needs Functional structures and statesmen, not self-centered politicians, Ghanaweb, Feature Article of Thursday, 11 February 2010, Okoampa-Ahoofe, Kwame.

I take the contrary position. It is rather not only Akufo-Addo's “perceived inability to readily reach out to his internal political opponents”, coupled with “the timing of his [President Mills] premiership”, but also his inability to effectively respond to the allegations of substance abuse, perceived arrogance, a repetitive and intrusive sense of ideological and moral bankruptcy that exude from his discourses, that make Akufo-Addo the under-dog in this race in which President Mills is clearly the front-runner. It is therefore a ridiculously disingenuous mischief to begin to cry foul even before the vote as to call for bloodshed. I shall be discussing this in detail later on, but first, let's go back to the quotation from Okoampa above, and try to come to terms with it.

What Okoampa is saying in simple English, is that President Mills defeated Akufo-Addo, or the NDC defeated the NPP simply because the NPP had been in power for eight years, and Ghanaians were tired of them and wanted change. For Okoampa, it had nothing to do with any innate ability of Candidate Mills who won, because it was all a matter of timing! And I think he is statistically correct. An NPP candidate who contests an NDC President after the eight-year term had expired, stands better chances of winning against an NDC candidate, and vice versa, as we saw after the end of the Rawlings' eight year term that ushered in President John Agyekum Kufour of the NPP. The same can be said of the eight year term of NPP President Kufour, that ushered in the NDC President Mills.

You would all recall the grievances we heard from strategic NPP power brokers in the Ashanti Region, which included well-connected candidates vying for powerful seats in the party, such as National Chairman, National Secretary, etc., who did not only feel aggrieved for having been cheated in the elections, but also felt aggrieved as regards the manner the party handled their grievances. Add to that melting pot, a shrewd and calculating Mr. Alan Kwadwo Kyeremanteng, also from the Ashanti Region, who must have thought of such dazzling arithmetic of timing, long before the implications of that, in terms of the internal politics of the NPP, dawned upon Okoampa-Ahoofe.

Add to that, Okoampa's own incessant attacks on President Kufour, which I described as “a state of cognitive dissonance” in an article on that subject when out of the blue Okoampa came to the defence of President Kufour over the Gizelle Yajzi scandal:

Are we now seeing in full display the long-awaited problem of THE CONGNITIVE DISSONANCE OF THE AKYEM MAFIA? I know Kufuor is now like "Asantrofi Anoma" to you people, and you people are yet to make up your minds whether to like him or hate him! The problem is you would want to use his records to win votes, but at the same time you want to distance yourselves from the numerous scandals! Now, all of a sudden you appear to put a brave face on it because of the obvious repercussions on the integrity of Mr. Akufo-Addo, who may have to position himself on this scandal if it continues to grow. An uncomfortable situation indeed, so by all means Kufour has to be innocent!” See: Gizelle Yajzi/Yadzi: Prikus Kufuorus Non Conscientum Habet! Feature Article of Wednesday, 25 August 2010, by Mensah, Nana Akyea.

Why so? Because, not long before this Okoampa had been on the back of President Kufour at the slightest pretext. It became so serious that I am sure many people tried to talk to him through various channels. For instance he complains that Otchere-Darko has forbidden him not to criticize a certain political enemy of Nana Akufo-Addo. He also reacts angrily to a wise counsel by Peter Owusu Boahene, in a rejoinder to Okampa's article, “Kufuor continues to campaign for Atta-Mills", to tone down his attacks on President Kufour and to plead for both Akyems and Ashantis to come together for the sake of Nana Addo, whom Okoampa also happens to support. The response from Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr. to this appeal should explain to any doubting Thomases anywhere whether or not the Ashanti-Akyem divide in the NPP is a hoax as they say. 

Under the title, "Comment: Did I Impress Your wife?" Okoampa charged:

"Man, are you good at spewing crap! All of a sudden, it is the fault of Owusu-Akyem Tenten Nana Kwame Okoampa-Agyeman! That I served as Local Government secretary under Rawlings when the judges you so much cared about went missing.

Yes, the Akyem-Mafia killed the judges!

Barima, ask those who went to secondary school with me: I was editing "The Mountaineer" when Kufuor was a Kwaku Baah lieutenant and B. B. Ofori was my genius Geography tutor!

In 1932, when the real Asante-Mafia ran my maternal grandfather, Rev. T. H. Sintim out of the Adum section of Kumasi and off his job as the first native-Ghanaian headteacher, for being criminally culpable of Akyem descent and heritage, as Justice Sarpong put it rather mildly a few days ago, Nana Yawbe Sintim-Aboagye was "acting high and mighty," as the expression is the exclusive behavioral preserve of Akyemfo.

Don't talk about Dr. Richard Anane now: I saw and read your large corpus of protest literature on Ghanaweb. Rather, let's talk about Mr. Osafo Maafo. Oh, no, no, no.... Why? Because he is only an
Akyem-Kotoku bastard!

My friend, where were you when the Ejisu-Piranhas ran me out of NPP-USA because I had dared to call Uncle Kofi Diawuo his real name?

And where were you when my own father, the founding-libator of the Amansie Society of New York was banished because one of your royal Asante-Angels suddenly discovered that his tabooed Akyem identity was stalling the progress of the organization?

My friend, you are lucky you are spewing such guff tens of miles away; else, I would strangle you and face execution by lethal injection!" - Author: Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Date: 2010-08-12 23:48:31 (See: Comment to: "RE: “Kufuor continues to campaign for Atta-Mills" Feature Article of Friday, 13 August 2010, by Columnist: Boahene, Peter Owusu).

A similar scene was repeated the first time Asamoah Boateng attempted to pay a visit to the Akufo-Addo Victory 2012 office in Accra. This time he was not called an Ejisu piranha. Asmaoh Boateng, everybody knows hails from Mankesim in the Central Region, yet they screamed “Agenda 2016!” Here is a story that speaks for itself:

“The New Patriotic Party (NPP), even in opposition, is a house divided against itself where factionalism has taken over sense of strategic reasoning DAYBREAK has gathered. 

Reports say some key persons who campaigned for Alan Kyerematen are not been tolerated at the Ridge campaign office of Nana Akufo Addo on suspicion that they have a 2016 agenda rather than a 2012 agenda.

So nasty is the development that former Information Minister, Stephen Asamoah Boateng, who supported the Alan Kyerematen flag-bearer bid, was recently booed, insulted and hooted at the front gate of the Nima residence of Nana Akufo Addo by some of his security details at the entrance.

Not only did they rain insults on Asamaoh Boateng but he was warned to leave the place and never return if he does not want to suffer a broken jaw. Some journalists who witnessed the nasty scene feared that the former Minister would be assaulted and they went to his rescue until an aide of Nana Addo intervened and whisked Asabee into the compound. The attackers were not even given a verbal rebuke.” (See: “Nana Addo Snubs Alan Boys” Ghanaweb, General News of Thursday, 30 September 2010, Source: DAYBREAK)

My point about the wailers is that these are the very same people who will wail the most, when the results turn out to confirm their stupidities! I would go as far as to say that apart from the cocaine scandal and marijuana fumes “first thing in the morning!”, which have completely shattered any chances of breaking through the competitive nature of Ghana's elections, the “Agenda '16” is yet another formidable challenge capable of delivering a deadly defeat to his presidential ambitions. At this juncture, one may ask, “What is Agenda 2016?” and it shall be treated as a genuine question. I shall try and give some insight into that question in this “dufument”.

This is my first major “dufument” of Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., as we approach the 2012 electoral year, and he begins to churn out more nonsense, and playing the drum major in the drums of war in Ghana we shall have the time to explain that Nana Akufo-Addo chances of winning any elections were even brighter in 2008 than they are today. Independent predictions like UK-based Economist Intelligence Unit is predicting a slim victory for the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC), if the 2012 general elections were held today. This has sent the signals to the business community, effectively enhancing the authority and prestige of the man to deal with in the foreseeable future as far as Ghana is concerned. 

This impression that President Mills is no lame duck administration probably explains some of the international curtsies and diplomatic strength the Mills Administration is enjoying currently. I was not surprised at the speed with which the Executive Board of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) unanimously endorsed a limit of US$3.4 billion on non-concessional borrowing for Ghana, just as an example, to the utter shock and chagrin of Otchere-Darko and his friends, including Akufo-Addo. It is against this background that I wish to wonder aloud, just what does Akufo-Addo mean by all-die-be-die because, somehow, someone is determined to rig the elections to deny him of victory? Who born dog? Who dash frog coat? 

You are even more unpopular than you were in 2008 when you lost. President Mills has even become more popular when it became apparent that he was not going to be a “poodle of Rawlings” as the Akufo-Addo camp had falsely predicted. He has the advantage of incumbency. He has a sounder academic background, and has displayed sound judgement in resisting Ghana being compelled into war with La Cote d'Ivoire, as Akufo-Addo and Okoampa and co stupidly insisted. 

Akufo-Addo was not surprised that he lost the 2008 Presidential elections. He had already been warned about it by Professor Larry Gibson in advance! Yet he was able to pretend that he could have won if his "numerous" supporters in the Volta Region had been allowed to vote! I think there is no need to wait for Akufo-Addo to lose to find out whether or not he is going to accept the results. I think he is automatically going to cry foul, even though his chances this time are even slimmer than the last time around!

From their own admissions, the Akufo-Addo campaign is not going well at all. In his recent article, Gabby Asare, the author, who is also the Executive Director of the Akufo-Addo PR-team known as "the Danquah Institute" admits that the NDC deserves "some credit for even succeeding in putting the opposition on the defensive much of the time." See: "Negative Campaign In Ghana And Lessons From .....", Feature Article of Saturday, 8 October 2011, Otchere-Darko. So, how can a relatively unpopular candidate, doomed to lose to the incumbent, blame his obvious unpopularity and inevitable defeat to cheating? That is the million-dollar question!

Akufo-Addo's problems with the crucial Ashanti vote which can make or break is far from resolved. Apparently the "Agenda 2016" Team led by Kufour and Allan Cash is even more optimistic and better organized than the "Victory 2012" in the Ashanti Region. It is the group which controls the Ashanti Region that will decide the winner, and all the indications are that they do. And these are people who have their own agenda, “affectionately” called “Agenda 16” by Nana Akufo-Addo and the wailers.

Indeed, the only way Akufo-Addo can hope to win the election is through rigging, but there are even internal forces within the NPP which would sabotage that for the sake of the “Agenda 2016” so what is he talking about? Is it another way of preparing the grounds in order to refuse to concede his inevitable defeat as he did in 2008, after his so-called “one-touch” victory campaign? The only reason why he keeps shouting “all-die-be-die” is simply because he was overwhelmed by the scandal of drug abuse and enjoyed the distractions that this particular stupidity generated: “We Akans are not cowards!” Apart from counting on mercenaries who intend to be paid with our oil money, Akufo-Addo cannot even garner enough support to wage war on the will of the people and on our democracy!

Keep building your statues of snow, but wail not, and behave like adults when you see them melting! At the end of the day the NPP has more to lose from the "Agenda 2016" menace than the NDC has to lose from the Rawlingses threat. The percentage of constituency under Alan Cash's command is far greater than the percentage as demonstrated in their respective congresses where "President John Mills won the NDC's National Delegates' Congress in Sunyani by a whooping 96.09% as against Nana Konadu's 3.01%", whilst Nana Akufo-Addo obtained 78.89 per cent in his own party. Mr John Alan Kwadwo Kyerematen polled 21,226 votes representing about 19.91 per cent. The dynamics do not bode well for the NPP, also because there is a frontal and direct contradiction between the Alan Cash "Agenda 2016" and the Akufo-Addo "Victory 2012".

"A wolf may eat a sheep now and then,
But thousands are killed by men,
An open foe may prove a curse,
But a pretended friend is worse"!

The NDC now has the "open foe" under control, but can the NPP say the same thing about their "pretended friends"? Whilst the Rawlingses are already talking of forming another political party, with preferably, the NDC logo, Akufo-Addo recently included Alan Kyeremanten in his campaign team, despite the visceral hatred of the Alan Cash "Agenda 2016" underground commandos. Alan Cash believes strongly that 2016 is his time, given to him by God himself. The Akufo-Addo "Victory 2012" is a threat to this "God-given" hope of Alan Cash, as Akufo-Addo could extend his political expiring date beyond 2012 to two terms ending in 2020, and making nonsense of the "Agenda 2016"!

Attention! There is a good reason why this is not in the public domain. This shall never be an operation that will be played out in the open. Both sides have come to the selfish conclusion that they need a strong façade of unity, whether 2012 or 2016, if they are to make any impact. Thus publicly they are friends! They have agreed to disagree. They tell each other, "if you are pretending to be a friend, we shall also pretend to be friends!" This is a house irrevocably divided against each other as the Ashanti Region is the strongest base of the party, the "Agenda 2016" which needs a defeat of Akufo-Addo, to spring into action, gives the NDC a fortuitous advantage even if the Rawlingses were to break away from the NDC.

As you can see, the title is a bit misleading for those who were expecting me to talk of “the wiki-weed problem” rather than Okoampa. That shall come later. I just want to emphasise the fact that Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe is just a tip of an iceberg. The only person who can do something about this problem is the stolid and indolent Akufo-Addo, who is quick to bring to order, the non-Akyem members of the party who fall out of line, such as the recent rebuke of the Honourable P.C. Ofori-Appiah over his remarks on Alan Kyeremanten. Even though several voices have been raised in the past and continue to be raised by both NPP sympathisers and opponents alike, Mr. Akufo-Addo has remained strangely silent when it comes to calling his Akyem cousins to order! 

Whom is he deceiving other than his own bloody-self as more and more NPP sympathisers begin to feel frustrated and pissed off by this sinful silence? This is a call for the first non-tribal political election campaign in our history, and it will pay a lot if Akufo-Addo saw the light and started his own anti-tribal campaign of his own and call some of his lieutenants like Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., to order! It would be a very small thing in itself, but certainly a good beginning. After all, as Kwame Nkrumah puts it, even though Rome was not built in a day, the building of Rome was started in a day This, Nana Akufo-Addo can do by first withdrawing the obnoxious statement, “We Akans are not cowards!” Otherwise, don't wail blaming “Antwi” when the inevitable happens!


Please let's stay in touch and on top of the NPP! Give me a follow on
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"To all men of goodwill, organize, organize, organize! The struggle is
far from over! We prefer self-government in danger, to servitude in tranquillity!

Forward ever, backward never"!

Nana Akyea Mensah, The Odikro.


Friday, July 8, 2011

Lack Of Leadership Materials In The NPP Is A Time Bomb! Part Two.



NPP On Cocaine: Obetsebi-Lamptey Is Pathetic!
Feature Article,
by Nana Akyea Mensah



'Ghana's election campaign could be tarnished by money from West African drug trafficking, an official has said. Kwesi Aning, head of research at the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre, said the "very fabric" of Ghanaian society was under threat.

- BBC. 'Drug money 'tainting Ghana poll',
28 October 2008 18:46 GMT


In a news story which first appeared on Joy Online and reported in the General News of Monday, 27 June 2011, on Ghanaweb, Name and shame politicians who use narcotic money - Dr. Aning, Dr. Aning, who is the Director of Research at the Kofi Annan Peace Keeping Centre says, the call by the Director of NACOB, Mr. Akrasi Sarpong, who in an interview told Joy FM’s Sammy Darko said that "if any politician dares us (NACOB) and uses narcotics money for politics, that person will be sorry. Whether you are an NDC or NPP or CPP or whatever, you will be sorry," is timely.

Dr. Aning appeared to be confirming what Mr. Akrasi Sarpong said. He was reported as saying "There is a long lasting relationship between narcotic money and the funding of political party activities in Ghana."

Dr. Aning said “Narcotics, whether it is Marijuana, Cocaine, Heroin, Ephedrine, Methamphetamine or [others] is beginning to pose both a political and security threat to this country. We are now internationally known not only as a traffic country or a transit country but as a country where the impact of these narcotics are beginning to have a cumulative negative impact.”

A narco-state is a clear nightmare. Apart from the direct devastations by the drug on families, they come in with guns. Mexico is as dangerous as Afghanistan, even though the war there is different. It is a war of drug cartels. There is not a single Ghanaian who will not be negatively impacted by a full-blown narco-state. That is why this is more than enough to deny the NPP at the ballot
en masse. It behoves on each responsible citizen to compel all political parties to tow the line.

First, it will drive away good business. This simply means more and more mouths to feed and less and less food to put into those mouths. As our population increases, job opportunities would be decreasing, only to be replaced by criminality. Furthermore, this would also mean that Ghanaians would no longer be able to travel freely. The few who manage to get visas shall be subjected to some of the most humiliating searches, such as peeps into the anus by Customs officials, at international airports, simply because they are carrying Ghanaian passports! This is what happens to citizens of countries which are designated as transit points for illicit drugs. Who wants this to happen to our country?

And the threat is growing. According to Dr. Aning, "the trade is growing as it has been discovered that between eight and fifteen percent of the narcotics entering main land Europe come through Ghana." Clearly, something correct needs to be done, and every peace-loving Ghanaian must support the initiatives to get on top on the fight by drug barons to steal our sovereignty and peace from us.

I was therefore extremely surprised that instead of lending the necessary moral support and the boost that is needed to make Ghana clean, the Chairman of the NPP is the only leader of a political party in Ghana not to take kindly to the words of the NACOB capo. What even makes this extremely strange and unnecessary was the fact that the NACOB boss was absolutely non-partisan in his warning: he mentioned all the political parties:

"if any politician dares us (NACOB) and uses narcotics money for politics, that person will be sorry. Whether you are an NDC or NPP or CPP or whatever, you will be sorry!" He did not mention any goat. All he said was that "his outfit has information that some politicians are heavily funded by drug barons adding that NACOB will deal with any politician caught to be using proceeds from the illicit trade notwithstanding the party that the person belongs to."

Of course, he added that "as the 2012 general elections approaches, NACOB will be very vigilant and monitor the situation carefully to bring to book any culprit found."

Why should any one who has nothing to do with drugs have an issue with this? Instead of welcoming and declaring his support, Jake Obetsebi Lamptey, reacting to the comments by the NACOB Boss on the Citi Eyewitness News, on Monday June 27, ordered Mr Akrasi Sarpong to "provide evidence to his claims and avoid speaking loosely."

Mr. Obetsebi-Lamptey complained:

“This is why people who are put in positions like this should not speak loosely, if things that you say, without providing any supporting evidence has the capacity to taint a person or a group of persons then you should avoid making certain comments at all."

This is in spite of the glaring fact that no goat has so far been mentioned! A fact which normally should make all goats comfortable, seems to irk some:

"If you really have any evidence that political parties are being financed by illicit drug whether from barons or not from barons then come out with evidence. But to come out to say generally that you are not going to allow political parities to be funded by drug money then straight away you are turning round to say that this is happening." Obetsebi-Lamptey is reported to have stated.

Indeed, the information concerning the names of the goats that the chairman of the NPP, Mr. Jake Obetsebi-Lamptey is publicly seeking from the NACOB boss, is the kind of information that any drug-pusher would pay huge sums of money to obtain: questions like, “what kind of leads do they have on me”? I was therefore amused to read Obetsebi Lamptey asking the NACOB boss to name politicians on the NACOB's list.

I was equally satisfied with the response from the NACOB boss to the NPP Chairman's call for the name of suspected politicians to be released, see: General News of Tuesday, 28 June 2011, NACOB boss refuses to name politicians on narcotic money list:

"The Executive Secretary of the Narcotic Control Board, Yaw Akrasi Sarpong has said he cannot be forced to disclose identities of suspected drug dealers on his watch list.

Defending his reason to issue the warning, Mr Sarpong said there are various ways to fight crime and the people who are involved need to know that they are being watched so that they can stay away from it."

Which makes complete nonsense of Obetsebi-Lamptey's rantings:

“If it is happening and you are in charge to make sure that it doesn’t happen then you should make sure that it doesn’t happen and not to generally castigate people in that light”.

And more so, when cast against a background where other experts have even been more categorical in the past:

"Some of these guys were my mates in school and they were not too successful, and they've been in politics for less than 10 years," Dr. Aning told the BBC in an interview on 28 October 08, "You don't make that kind of money in 10 years."

He said he was talking about people "running for parliament, who are ministers, wanting to run for president". This was in 2008.

"It's not only about politics or politicians, it's about the police service, it's about customs, it's about immigration, it's about the judiciary, it's about our traditional institutions," he said.

"What I'm saying is that the very fabric of Ghanaian society is under threat."

"Ghana's politicians say they are determined to fight drug trafficking, but many question whether the political will exists in a society where corruption is a major problem," BBC West Africa correspondent Will Ross reported in 2008, when the NPP was in power.

What Obetsebi-Lamptey's reaction tells me is that there is no longer even such a determination in the leadership of the NPP, if any ever existed, and Obetsebi-Lamptey's reaction must be seen in terms of the level of the political will to fight the crime.

Mr Aning also said in the BBC story that "political rhetoric needed to be followed by action, suggesting there should be more sniffer dogs and better exchanges of intelligence."

From the hostile reaction of Jake to the very topic, we can not even talk about a "political rhetoric" to rid Ghana of narcotics, let alone to "follow it with action". It is simply no longer on the agenda of the NPP. What will happen now, since even at the time they were only at the level of "political rhetoric", they were actively assisting drug smugglers to evade the law? My real fear is what is going to happen should these people return to power!

We should not too soon forget the fact that Addo Kufour, the president's brother and then Minister of the Interior, run away from the then BBC's West African correspondent, Mr. Will Ross, because he was not prepared to answer questions about how he was fighting the drugs trade, after the arrest and subsequent release without charge or trial of five women of the Executive Committee of the Women's Wing of the Dzorwulu NPP were busted at the Kotoka airport whilst attempting to board an airline bound to the United States with large quantities of heroin.

This was the last straw that broke the camel's back, and Ghana's credibility in the fight against narco-trafficking, under the NPP Administration, came to its lowest point. It was a shame to read on BBC: "Ghana's interior ministry has so far declined to grant an interview on drug trafficking"! Indeed, if Obetsebi-Lamptey had not asked the NACOB boss to mention the goats, we would have missed the best part of the story. After declaring that he is keeping the names closely to his chest, Mr. Akrasi Sarpong further expressed disappointment in the manner in which the case involving the missing parcels of cocaine was handled in the past.

“In the past the police did a beautiful work. That work that was done by the police was not backed by the hierarchy of the police. It was done by officers who were down the line. Look we know what happened,” he said.

Security analyst, Dr. Kwesi Aning concurs:

"There is a long lasting relationship between narcotic money and the funding of political party activities in Ghana."



Our reputation as a narco-state would have been firmly established had the NPP won the 2008 Parliamentary and especially, the Presidential elections. Barely after two years of coming into power of President Mills, the tides changed. I was very relieved to read the General News of Thursday, 4 February 2010, U.S. Hails Ghana’s Track Record, The story read:

"The United States government has commented Ghana for the progress it has made in the fight against drug trafficking, saying the gains are impressive.

Johnnie Carson, US Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, at a meeting with President Mills at the Castle, Osu yesterday said the cooperation between Ghana and the US and other partners in the fight against drug trafficking and other cross-border crimes was yielding impressive results."

My reaction to the news on ghanaweb.com speaks for itself:


“Author: Nana Akyea Mensah, The Odikro.
Date: 2010-02-04 09:43:42

Hi NANA Ø !!.

One reason why I worked day and night to ensure the defeat of the NPP at the last polls was the danger they posed in the development of a narco state with all the attendant problems of violent crimes and the inconvenience of having our private parts including anus carefully screened at all international airports each time you travel overseas, all because of these greedy bastards! We were quite close to it! It was such a pity to see Addo Kufour, the president's brother and then Minister of the Interior, running away from the BBC's West African correspondent Mr. Will Ross because he was not prepared to answer questions about the arrest and subsequent release without charge or trial of five women of the Executive Committee of the Women's Wing of the Dzorwulu NPP were busted at the Kotoka airport whilst attempting to board an airline bound to the United States with large quantities of heroin. Rumours have it that it took the timely and personal intervention of the President's wife, Madam Theresa Kufour to get these drug barons off the hook! Oh Ghana! Even our First Lady became complicit in the narcotics business!

This reports coming from the USA makes me heave a big sigh of relief! I am happy I supported the NDC against the NPP! And it gives me so much pleasure as this piece of news encourages me to do so again come 2012!

We shall not sit down and allow the illicit business of a greedy and unconscionable few to put at risk a dignified flight through international airports without curious anti-drug enforcement officials peeping through your anus simply because you are carrying a Ghanaian passport!

Thank you very much President Mills! You are a President worthy of respect!

Have a nice day Nana O!!.”

The problem is not simply one of dry bones being mentioned in a proverb, and old people feeling unease; it is also about how this unease is expressed. Jake Obetsebi-Lamptey got the most nonsensical set of words ever to be uttered by any politician in the NPP expressing such perfectly understandable unease! And this “style” of leadership looks certain to continue. A famous Roman general once said “I more fear a stupid ally than I fear a clever enemy”. How right he was! With problems of cocaine abuse of his own to deal with, and hanging like a dark cloud over the party's flag-bearer's head, Akufo-Addo must be savouring the simplicity of the truth of the Roman general's rather candid observation.




Forward Ever! Backwards Never!!!
Cheers!
--
Nana Akyea Mensah, The Odikro.

Blog: /nanaakyeamensah.blogspot.com/
Twitter: /twitter.com/TheOdikro



There are hypertext links to some of the news stories referred to in the article, which may not appear in this publication, interested readers who want to know more are invited to come to my blog: Feature Articles: http://nanaakyeamensah.blogspot.com/

Monday, July 4, 2011

Is the NPP An Integral Part Of Ghana's Drug Problems?


Feature Article, by Nana Akyea Mensah, The Odikro.

I am very surprised that the NPP seems to be the only political party unilaterally feeling the heat of a declaration that was essentially meant for all the political parties in Ghana. All the other political parties have welcomed the declaration by the NACOB boss concerning the influence of drug barons on some politicians, and the threat that this represents to our body-politic. Why this is clearly amazing is the fact that the Executive Secretary of NACOB did not even single out a political party in Ghana. It was a general appeal or warning to all political parties. 

Let us have another look of what Mr. Akrasi Sarpong said:

“if any politician dares us (NACOB) and uses narcotics money for politics, that person will be sorry. Whether you are an NDC or NPP or CPP or whatever, you will be sorry!”

He did not mention any goat. All he said was that “his outfit has information that some politicians are heavily funded by drug barons adding that NACOB will deal with any politician caught to be using proceeds from the illicit trade notwithstanding the party that the person belongs to.”

Is the NPP a part of the solution or a part of the problem? That is the question!

One of the latest attempts to deal with the issue comes from Dr. Arthur Kennedy, whose complaint is that "On the face of it, there is nothing wrong with the NACOB’S boss sounding the alarm on drugs." Dr. Kennedy then postulates: "However, a careful reading of Mr. Sarpong’s comments, together with comments by other government officials show clearly that Mr. Sarpong’s comments may be part of a public relations campaign to link the NPP to drugs and thus dent its reputation and support." See: "The use of narcotic money in our politics".

What we would like Dr. Kennedy to throw more light on is a statement attributed to him during his ill-fated bid for the flag-bearership of the NPP. Some of us would like to know if he did or he did not caution “NPP delegates who would be voting to elect their presidential candidate to be mindful of some of the aspirants who have been going round splashing money on them because the source of the money could be a questionable one.”?

I read the story from the following link, never saw the original news story, that is why I am asking! I got the story from here: “Tell them that they may know”, by FOKAA (FRIENDS OF KENNETH ASAFO-ADJEI), Feature Article | Sun, 21 Dec 2008:

“If we do not take our time, one cocaine dealer would just take his money and buy this country and put our lives in danger.” – Dr. Arthur Kennedy. “Dr Kwabena Arthur Kennedy also cautioned NPP delegates who would be voting to elect their presidential candidate to be mindful of some of the aspirants who have been going round splashing money on them because the source of the money could be a questionable one.”
Also, whilst at it, is it possible for Dr. Kennedy to kindly elaborate on how he managed to examine Akufo-Addo with your bare eyes and be able to claim, as a medical officer, that "Akufo Addo does not a drop of cocaine in his blood"? I read the following on Ghanaweb General News of Sunday, 28 November 2010, "Akufo-Addo Doesn’t Have A Drop Of Blood Tainted With Cocaine - Physician"

"A certified medical practitioner" the story began, "says he can officially state that Nana Addo Danquah Akufo Addo, flag bearer of the opposition NPP does not even have a minute drop of cocaine in his blood. He claims as a medical doctor who has handled several cases of drug abuse and addicts, he can attest to the fact that Nana Addo is not a drug addict."

Just by looking at him, "Dr. Kobina Arthur Kennedy says he is certain that Nana Addo has never been under the influence of drugs"!

I want Arthur Kennedy to answer the following:

"Is Arthur Kennedy telling us he has a medical laboratory attached to his eye sights?

Did he ask Mr. Akufo-Addo to even open his mouth for him to examine his teeth? You don't need to be a medical doctor to know that one of the symptoms of the premature loss of teeth is as a result of a long period of drug abuse.

Dr. Kennedy cannot tell an HIV infected blood from one filled to the brim with Plasmodium falciparum! What do we say when such a doctor wants to give a clean bill of health to a suspect with a toothless mouth and no hair on his head? We also know that in addition to the premature loss of teeth, the other visible symptom is the loss of hair?"

Kofi Wayo claims majority of the ‘cocaine politicians’ are within the NPP.

“A lot of these cocaine guys are in NPP, yes. I know the big men in NPP all knew about (jailed former NPP MP) Eric Amoateng. Now it comes out that Yaw Anfo-Kwakye, Akufo-Addo’s Chief of Staff (sic) was arrested before for drugs. So why does he still keep him? These are the questions that show we have no morals and ethics. And we suffer for it. Go to London or Paris and see how they search you because you are from Ghana."

 
The NPP has serious questions to answer Ghanaians about this, and I find the excuses they have been making extremely irresponsible!

Thank you for your attention.

Forward Ever! Backwards Never!!!
Cheers!

Nana Akyea Mensah, The Odikro