Come On, Solomon Nkansah!

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

By its very designation, the job of NDC Propaganda Secretary belongs to both a congenital and a pathological liar. This kind of political appointment in postcolonial Ghana began with the Animal Farm-type government headed by President Kwame Nkrumah and his so-called Convention People's Party. Today, the CPP is a mere ghost, or shadow, of its former self, as Prof. Adu-Boahen would have mildly put it.

It gets even more intriguing when one is named Deputy Propaganda Secretary of the National Democratic Congress. It simply means that one is not such a very good liar, after all. And here, of course, I am talking about Mr. Solomon Nkansah, the latest of the Mahama pit-bulls to sink his teeth into the flesh of the Rt.-Rev. Stephen R. Bosomtwi-Ayensu (also spelled as "Bosomtwe"), of the Obuasi diocese of the Methodist Church of Ghana. The latter is reported to have said that President Mahama needs to appreciably "step up his game" in order to better the socioeconomic morass in which most Ghanaians are currently wallowing (See "Rev. Bosomtwe-Ayensu Is A Known NPP Man - Solomon Nkansah Claims" MyJoyOnline.com / Modernghana.com 1/31/14).

What makes Mr. Nkansah a pathetic liar is his claim that "since the NPP has lost credibility in the Ghanaian body politic, it needs opinion leaders and respected people in the country to prosecute its agenda against the government." Now, this is a glaring contradiction in terms, for it takes great credibility for a giant political organization like the main opposition New Patriotic Party (NPP) to command the support and sympathy of "respected people" and distinguished "opinion leaders" like the Obuasi Methodist bishop.

But what is even more significant is that the phrases quoted above are the exact words of the NDC's Deputy Propaganda Secretary, as has been widely published by the Ghanaian media. In sum, it goes without saying that if, indeed, Mr. Nkansah firmly believes that the Rev. Bosomtwi-Ayensu is both a "respected person" and a formidable "opinion leader," then, perforce, the Obuasi Methodist prelate must be saying something that touches a raw nerve and has forensically verifiable basis in factual reality.

The latter also clearly explains the frantic desperation with which Mahama hangers-on like Messrs. Nkansah and Twum-Boafo, the CEO of the Free Zones Board, have lit into Bishop Bosomtwi-Ayensu. Consequently, Mr. Nkansah's rather intemperate attempt to tarnish the image and reputation of Bishop Bosomtwi-Ayensu, by disdainfully, and distastefully, labeling the latter as "a known NPP member in cassock," will not wash.

It will not wash because there is absolutely no clause, or provision, in Ghana's 1992 Constitution stipulating that ordained priests of any recognized Ghanaian church can neither belong to either of the country's two major political parties, nor reserve no right to exercise the franchise. His most ardent critics have a far greater chance of whittling away at the prelate's hard-earned reputation by frontally debating Bishop Bosomtwi-Ayensu on the facts and realities on the ground, vis-a-vis the incontrovertibly dismal performance of the Mahama government, than luridly and viciously attempting to tag and summarily destroy their more morally and intellectually formidable ideological nemesis.

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*Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.
Department of English
Nassau Community College of SUNY
Garden City, New York
Feb. 2, 2014
E-mail: [email protected]
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