Ghana - In The Matter Of Saying ‘Goodbye To Honesty’ ...

But Welcoming Dishonesty: Why Corruption Would Remain Forever.

I am opening my write-up on the multi-purpose subject above with my own fear of the hypocrisy it moves with, even in the face of the fellow who may like to behold himself as ‘holier than thou’. And this fear fits in well, the situation where “Ghana Has Said Goodbye To Honesty”. The quoted adieu to “HONESTY” was attributed to Arch-Bishop Emeritus Dery of blessed memory when I was in my early youthful age. I, as a matter of ignorance did not understand what he meant, but why for over 35 years it keeps resonating baffles me.

I must admit, though, that as time progressed and I also grew older I began appreciating the concern of the then energetic Bishop. At least I have witnessed and heard military takeovers of governments, assigning reasons of DIS-HONESTY, CORRUPTION and all the numerous etceteras in justifying the take-overs. In some of the brutal interventions citizens lost their lives and properties. In a few of those casualties - justification must be acknowledged as against others who suffered at the hands of their own enemies.

In all the interventions, however, we have ‘permanently’ failed to identify and HONOUR those who have superbly lived their lives to the fullest in terms of HONESTY. If acts of dishonesty have prizes to be paid for, what compensates well for acts of HONESTY?

It must be emphasized here, that those who practice the former, do not even want to trumpet their lives of discipline, but that is not to say they shun recognition.

This category of Ghanaians, work assiduously, diligently and for that matter PATRIOTICALLY to see Mother-Ghana move forward to success. They worked, and some are still working with little or no incentives at all, but the energy that pushed them was and still is – their love for country. I cannot forget one of Arica’s best neuro-surgeons, Dr. Ali Mustafa who did almost his whole life-time at the Korle’bu Teaching Hospital, curing people with neurological (brain or head) problems. On retirement, he was thrown out of his official bungalow because he had no place of his own to move to. A former patient of his heard of the renowned surgeons plight and went to his rescue by offering him a flat in which he lived and died later.

Note that this former patient’s gratitude to this PATRIOT was just for a short period of care, as compared to decades of DEDICATED service to Ghana. YES! This is the pettiness of attitude we can, as a country, exhibit towards our patriots. Can this shabby treatment encourage citizens to be patriotic? From the same Korle’bu Teaching Hospital, two other personalities who have over the years given their lives to the service of the nation through the nation’s premiere hospital cannot be skipped in this article.

The first amongst the two, who is now on pension, is one Mr. George Asamoaning who was at the Supply Stores of the hospital. For his over three decades of stewardship, no auditing report ever queried him. I had the honour of being close to his family and knew of the family’s disciplined lifestyle. I was pleasantly excited when he told me he left on retirement without any adverse finding against him, and that he further left his phone number behind for easy contact should they find something against him in his absence. Not only that! For he in addition to the above, rejected a contract offer in the same hospital with the excuse that the young should be given the chance to also serve their country.

The irony is that this man has had no honour, in terms of recognition whatsoever from the hospital administration. From the narration above, is it not trite saying that Ghana, indeed, has said “good-bye to honesty”?

In the case of the other, he has been a dedicated security man for the hospital since the late 1970s. He rose from an ordinary security man to become a Chief Security Officer. His honesty led to a then Director-General of the Ghana Health Service alluding to the fact that if this man were present in the hospital, a number of major items could not have gone missing.

The man he was referring to is one Jerome Asigre. At the time of the missing absurdities, no one seemed to have a solution to the ugly developments. When the man was however, put in charge, he in no time managed to retrieve almost all the missing items which were of enormous value to the hospital. One of such items was allegedly retrieved from a private hospital in the Asante Region, belonging to a highly placed medical practitioner in the teaching hospital. Asigre, from the acts of retrievals, rose to become the Chief Security Officer when the position became vacant, only to be victimized thereafter. He was moved from the hospital and sent to the headquarters of the Ghana Health Service (G.H.S) where one can sometimes see him directing traffic as an act of dedication – but not as a duty since he has subordinates there who should take up the task.

It was however, a demeaning move. For the numerical strength of security personnel he was managing at the hospital were in the three hundred capacity, as compared to the less than twenty at G.H.S headquarters.

He has been there since around 2007. So, from Korle’bu Teaching Hospital to Ghana Health Service, Ghanaians have not seen a sense of dedication in him for mention. Thus, is this how we can pay our patriots for their acts of HONESTY? In fact, over the years that I have known him he has always been uncompromising when it comes to engaging in fraudulent activities.

In 1986 or there-about, an elementary school boy at the time run a reasonable distance to a railway-traffic control station in the Western Region to inform the officers about a tree which had fallen across a rail-track, and the need for its clearance before the next coming train. This singular act saved a property and lives which would have been lost to the state. In the year under reference, the boy’s name was mentioned via the media. That was the end. This PATRIOT may be in his thirties if only he is alive. But who cares in Ghana to look out for him for the state to appreciate him Bongo is in the Upper-East Region. In 1982, then Ordinary Ranks of the Ghana Border Guards were escorting articulator trucks loaded with maize on their way to then Upper Volta (now Burkina Faso). The local Militia men at the time intercepted them and demanded their return to Bolga.

At this stage the armed guards got down from the trucks and ordered the guys to leave the scene. All of them fled except one guy who was only identified as Asampanbilla. He dared the guards who shot him at close-range and within view of the mother who was sitting at the fore-court of their family house. The body was left there for the family and community to attend to it. But the men succeeded in sending the smuggled goods across the border to Burkina Faso which is about nine miles from Bongo. Nothing happened thereon, except that the victim was buried on the very spot of his death. The culprits were never arrested and the case died its “natural death” as Ghanaians would have it. The last time I found myself in Bongo as a native as well as ‘tourist’, it was with difficulty before I could identify his tomb.

Not even in the name of the REVOLUTION for which this PATRIOT died, could cadres of the district and that of the region organize a memoriam for him once. He, indeed, died a ‘fowl’s’ death – an UNDIGNIFIED one. In December, 1987, another young patriot rejected a bribe of 20Million old Ghana Cedis when he personally monitored an Indian hemp cartel involving a few Ghanaians and some British nationals and got them arrested. According to the gentleman the police told him it was the largest single haul in the history of the Service at the time. The state never acknowledged him.

Recently the United States of America, through her Embassy in Ghana, honoured one of our own, a hitherto unknown Ghanaian medical professional. In Ghana the practice of medicine is seen as a profession of grandeur. But this patriot of our land has rightly considered medicine as a calling, for that matter a vocation, but not a chosen profession of gain.

Incidentally, the recipient of the “MARTIN LUTHER KING AWARD FOR PEACE”, Dr. David Abdulai, has been in his humbled but patriotic engagement of helping the poor and the needy in society for the past 25 years. The establishment of his Shekhina Clinic which has greatly helped the less-fortunate in the Tamale Metropolis has gone somehow un-noticed locally.

I am saying “somehow” because one exception must be high-lighted here. The BBC focus on Africa magazine came out with a comprehensive reportage on the SHEKHINA CLINIC sometime in the late eighties or early nineties. That is an international media entity. The Ghanaian public media houses (“Daily Graphic” and the “Ghanaian Times”) did report on it not because of professional curiosity, but they had to do so because a head of state was visiting the facility. Yes! It was then Chairman J.J. Rawlings who had head of the humble service Dr. David Abdulai was rendering the under-privileged which made him to humble himself to the clinic. Close to twenty years after that landmark visit, the question is how many media houses in Ghana have considered a comprehensive write-up on the clinic? To the best of my knowledge, not a single line of notice of the clinic and Dr. David Abdulai have been captured by our local media men and women.

It is worth mentioning the host of Thank God It’s Friday (TGIF), Kweku Sintim Misah (KSM), who brought Dr. David Abdulai to his programme sometime last year. Since KSM has the nostrils that can smell the aroma of PATRIOTIC engagements by some citizenry, why not give this credit to him as well. On March 6, 2012, MOTHER-GHANA celebrated her 55th Birthday. Every year the ritual of Independence Day is observed. A few days to the main day, all kinds of write-ups are done fore-telling how the day came to be, the major pre-independence memorial being the 28th February Cross-Roads. This day has always been celebrated, eulogizing the PATRIOTS Sgt. Adjetey, Odartey Lamtey and the rest. However, one other PATRIOT who, over the years has been left out is one Inspector Salifu Kanjaga.

I remember Kwesi Pratt Jnr and Abdul Malik Kweku Baako Jnr mention the man on a few occasions as to the saving roles he played on the day under reference. According to them when the British commander ordered the Castle guards to shoot at the armless Adjetey and his colleagues, it was Salifu Kanjaga who gave a counter command in Hausa that his fellow men should not shoot. He asked that they shoot into the air but not their fellow men as targets.

The narration was only given flavor on March 9, when KSM went beyond the mention level, to bring the living wife of Salifu Kanjaga @90, his grand daughter and nephew. It was a lively footage to behold. Those who were privileged to have watched it will attest to how shabby we treat our HEROES.

Salifu Kanjaga, just as FINANCIER PAA GRANT of our independence struggle had been covered in the ‘pot of forgetfulness’. Thankfully, the likes of KSM will not allow that to happen. This is where I feel urging him on to trace the family of Paa Grant and let them also tell us of their experience. I brought in these remote accounts to further stress my opinion on the UNGRATEFULNESS of this country to its citizens.

Coming back to those mentioned earlier on, there are several others I know who for the sake of time cannot be mentioned here. But the irony is that all those talked about considered HONESTY and PATRIOTISM to be the guiding principles of their existence on earth. So, the question is –what reward does one get for being an HONEST PATRIOT? NOTHING!

Comparing honest lifestyles to that of those who live by engaging in corrupt activities and the difference will be too huge for one to ignore. Gone are the days when people completed school and accepted any job offered them. Today it is not so. Job seekers are selective, considering what they can make within the shortest time possible whether by foul or any other means. Our youth are now interested in the Police, the Armed Forces, Immigration, CEPS etc. And one may have no need of asking what motivates them. For, a large number of personnel of the institutions mentioned above live beyond their official means of livelihood.

Amongst them, it is only the Ghana Armed Forces which in a way have no illegitimate ways of making wealth, as compared to their counterparts of the other institutions. The only period that the forces became an attractive employment avenue was when United Nations Peace-Keeping Operations were introduced. For the rest of the institutions there are just a few personnel who resist the temptation of giving in to illegitimate means of making wealth. When this category of workers is seen, the humility in them tells a lot. Their subordinates ride in flashy cars and live in their own homes. The honest ones live in rented premises and sometimes harassed by their landlords and ladies. They join ‘trotros’ and taxis to work, and worst of all – nobody recognizes them.

The prove is therefore, clear that dishonesty REWARDS physically whereas HONESTY does not. Should one therefore, live an honest life and die a pauper, in-dignified and unrecognized. Can one ignore the pegs of a corrupt lifestyle? If the former is worth selecting, we would not have so many people paying their way into politics to be elected into political service.

Some have even killed or got into some occult engagements to win – politically. If the electorate is therefore, bribed or hypnotized to vote for the politician, what happens thereafter if the politician wins? Those who finance the politician must be taken care of if political power is won. So, from the top of political power, corruption slides down to those who must be ‘forced’ to become patrons of the canker. In fact, CORRUPTION is the ‘JUST’ means to survival in Ghana. And it is so because it has become part of our DEMOCRATIC governance. HONESTY and PATIOTISM are not rewarding principles to engage in. That is why Dr. Ali Mustafa died a poor man without a home. Mr. George Asamoaning is now on pension without a landed property of his own. Jerome Asigre may be going home without boasting of a quarter plot of land in his name. Even National Awards are not accorded this crop of human beings called citizens of Ghana. Awards are rather given to some known corrupt citizens who do not deserve them.

Thus folks, has “GHANA” not said “GOODBYE TO HONESTY”? Yes, she has - and welcomes CORRUPTION for NATIONAL AWARDS.

Camillus Maalneriba-Tia Sakzeesi [email protected] Te:0266223333/0248433700