Alan Kyerematen: From Foolishness to Madness

By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.
Garden City, New York
Sept. 3, 2014
E-mail: [email protected]

Just when some of the most faultingly optimistic and idealistic ones among us were beginning to believe that Mr. Alan John Kwadwo "Quitman" Kyerematen was, somehow, healthily inching along the long and painful path of emotional and intellectual maturity, and constructively beginning to see the egregious errors of his foolish-selfishness and mend his ways, accordingly, there emerges the clinical megalomaniac in comical defiance of his apocalyptic defeat, rudely and obscenely stabbing at the wind and poking his fingers into its imaginary privates and raving like a madman chasing the mirage of his effectively shattered presidential ambitions.

Looking at one of his most recent political photographs, the man had such a sinister facial appearance that readily made the critical observer envisage Satan's double in the same. Well, well, well... the devilish lengths to which some people would go in a rabid bid to grabbing at raw power devoid of any meaningful agenda. At any rate, what intrigued me in no small measure, and one that may well have precipitated his Waterloo, was when Alan Cash, as Mr. Kyerematen is popularly known, told the host of a Kumasi-based radio program that in 1996, when he was prevailed upon by cooler heads to defer to the giant likes of then-Candidate John Agyekum-Kufuor and Messrs. Kwame Pianim and J. H. Mensah, he (Mr. Kyerematen) made a "supreme sacrifice" in deciding to back down for his emotional, intellectual and cultural superiors.

If the preceding does not constitute the very height of arrogance, I really don't know what else does. It is also rather pathetic that scarcely a week ago, Mr. Kyerematen was vacuously pontificating about the need for disgruntled party members to wisely and civilly use laid-down protocol for resolving their grievances, instead of resorting to the nihilistic use of violence and playing into the hands of their political opponents. Back then, as I vividly recall, I made the critical observation that Mr. Cash had absolutely no credibility whatsoever and did not know half of what he was talking about.

Now it is tragically clear that Mr. Kyerematen never rescinded his 2008 resignation from the New Patriotic Party. He also has absolutely no intention of playing by rules aimed at uniting the party. But that Mr. Cash and his chief propagandist, Nana Ohene-Ntow, the former NPP General-Secretary, went into the August 31 Super-Delegates' Congress promising to cause a tidal wave of electoral upset, or a Tsunami, but ended up roiling up only a whiff of breath that could not even blow out a single candle on a birthday cake, ought to clearly inform these two rascals that the NPP 2016 Progress Train has left them far back and behind in time.

But, of course, it is also quite understandable that Mr. Cash and his human pit-bull called Mr. Ohene-Ntow should flatly refuse to civilly and constructively back down for the sake of party unity. They are in abject denial; and soon, regret and sorrow will set in. They are also understandably traumatized. But count out any sincere and/or genuine expression of shame. These guys are veritable "Ajangudas," highway armed robbers who prefer the proverbial primrose path to civilized rules of engagement. It is also irreparably clear (and by the way, I have maintained the same for quite awhile now) that Mr. Kyerematen implacably envisages Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo as his arch-nemesis, or mortal enemy, rather than healthily as either his rival or political opponent.

You see, so determined is Mr. Cash to either seize undeserved and unearned power by hook or crook that he wouldn't mind exchanging his very soul for the same. And woefully failing to secure legitimate power, Mr. Kyerematen is apparently prepared to take the very bright future of the New Patriotic Party down with him. And this is precisely where the frontline members of the party ought to promptly draw the line. And that, of course, means that the only choice by which to move the New Patriotic Party onto the progressive road to the august seat of governance and the rapid economic recovery and development of the country, is to promptly and summarily expell Mr. Cash and his mercenaries and goons from the party!

Party Elders and the Judicial Committee, National Executive Committee and the National Executive Council ought not to allow sophistic and baseless arguments about the purportedly entrenched democratic tradition of the New Patriotic Party to be mischievosly used to strangle the aspirations of Ghanaians direly in search of a progressive and productive alternative to the Kyerematen-backed and Mahama-led National Democratic Congress. The prophetic advice of Mr. B. J. Da Rocha still holds and ought to be the inescapable guide.

Long live the house of Danquah, Busia and Dombo! Long live Ghana! Fellow Ghanaians, Akufo-Addo and Bawumia are on the way with meaningful help and direction for you!

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