Asiedu-Nketia and the Disingenuous Distillation of Dishonesty

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

Somebody recently descibed the General-Secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), Mr. Johnson Asiedu-Nketia, as a man suffering from "an acute bout of verbal diarrhea." I couldn't agree more with such spot-on diagnosis. Indeed, the Seikwa, Brong-Ahafo, native may well be also suffering from cognitive dissonance.

Else, how could the Bui Dam Woyome so cavalierly presume to differentiate between the behavioral acts of "corruption" and "dishonesty," let alone attempt to quixotically subsume the act of "corruption" under "dishonesty"? I also wish that I could concur with him, when General Mosquito, as he is popularly known, glibly declares as follows: "If we are able to deal with dishonesty, it would be very easy to deal with corruption" (See "Ghana's Biggest Problem Is Dishonesty, Not Corruption - Asiedu-Nketia" MyJoyOnline.com / Ghanaweb.com 1/8/14).

Maybe the NDC verbal-scribe needs to be reminded of the fact that when it came to light that while serving on the board of directors of the Bui Dam Project, he was also selling the most exorbitantly priced cement blocks to the Bui Dam Authority, supervisors of the construction of the country's second-largest hydroelectric power plant, and was confronted with this glaring conflict-of-interest situation, Mr. Asiedu-Nketia's unethical and corrupt and criminally dishonest behavior was staunchly backed by Mr. Jabesh Amissah-Arthur, brother of the Vice-President and board chairman of the Bui Dam Project. General Mosquito also dishonestly claimed that his cement blocks were relatively of the highest quality, compared to those supplied the Authority by his contractual competitors. The logical question then was, why would the Bui Dam Authority consent to the wasteful use of taxpayers' money by contractually agreeing to be supplied sub-standard cement blocks by the competitors of Mr. Asiedu-Nketia?

What I am, of course, trying to get at here is that both Messrs. Asiedu-Nketia and Jabesh Amissah-Arthur so dishonestly and venally acted in the trusted capacity of policymakers. And so precisely how does Mr. Asiedu-Nketia expect any ordinary citizen of the country to be able to fiercely fight a pathologically determined kleptocratic politician like General Mosquito and his powerful and staunchly supportive paymasters? And also, just exactly what does he mean by his rather cynical assertion that "Ghana since independence has not been able to win the fight against corruption, because people are not willing to change their attitudes? Precisely which people is he talking about? And what attitudes does he have in mind?

The truth of the matter is that it is the sworn and elected leaders of any society who set the tone and pattern of moral behavior, or otherwise, for the citizenry at large. Indeed, his first act of dishonesty in the wake of Election 2012 was for Mr. Asiedu-Nketia to have impishly gloated over the fact of the leaders of the main opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) having supposedly lacked adequate electoral vigilance skills, or flair, which, in the publicly stated opinion of the NDC General-Secretary, enabled the Mahama campaign operatives to effectively rig the ballot in their paymaster's favor.

And then, of course, he went to court, took a solemn oath, swore to tell the truth, and nothing but the truth. And then like the unconscionable pathological liar that he is widely known to be, Mr. Asiedu-Nketia proceeded to do just the diametrically opposite, that is, blasphemously lie through his pit-bull's teeth by vehemently denying that he had ever made any such public statement in the electronic media, even when directly confronted with incontrovertible audiotaped recording of his own evidentiary giveaway.

Indeed, there can be no gainsaying the fact that Rev. Joseph Obiri Yeboah Mantey is dead-on-target, when the President of the National Conference of Presbyterian Ministers poignantly observes the strikingly inverse nexus between the shameless stentorian rhetorical pretence by Ghanaian leaders to impeccable religiosity, and the abjectly stygian rash of rank corruption among the fold of the topmost leadership of the country.

The fact of the matter here, though, is that warts and all, Mr. Asiedu-Nketia seems to have a point; and I would be darn dishonest to deny this otherwise rascally politician the same. And it regards the fact, indeed, for most of the postcolonial era, Ghanaian clergymen and women and, in fact, religious leaders in general, have themselves remarkably contributed to such high level of corruption by hypocritically and unctuously preaching the shockingly, albeit predictably, anodyne gospel of godly regard and servile obedience to our national leaders. Even the most brutally corrupt and ungodly among this reprobate pack of parasites.

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*Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.
Department of English
Nassau Community College of SUNY
Garden City, New York
Jan. 8, 2014
E-mail: [email protected]
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