James Gunu Captures the “Herd Mentality” Syndrome

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

In the wake of Togbe Afede XIV’s exhortation to residents and citizens of the Volta Region to critically start rethinking their hitherto monolithic ideological and political relationship with the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC), Mr. James Gunu, an NDC activist, came out to vehemently disagree with the Agbogbomefia of the Ho-Asogli State who also doubles as President of the Volta Regional House of Chiefs (See “Volta Region Not Ready to Shed NDC Garb – Activist” Ghanaweb.com 1/14/12).
Anyway, as I emphatically pointed out earlier on, the Yale University-educated Togbe Afede, who is an even more prominent and distinguished member of the National Democratic Congress, never in any way, shape or form suggested a massive realignment in electoral loyalty on the part of the citizens of the Volta Region from the NDC to the New Patriotic Party (NPP) or any other political party, for that matter. And so, what really is the problem or grievance of Mr. Gunu?
It is also not clear precisely what Mr. Gunu means when he rather fatuously and facilely asserts that “parties in some other democracies have safe seats and support domains.” Maybe what the NDC activist meant to say was that the people of the Volta Region derive some exclusive and special benefits when the NDC wields the reins of governance than when the NPP, for one ready example, is voted into the seat of governance. The cynical response of some NDC youth groups to the Woyome “Gorgormi” Scandal is a salient case in point.
Still, the fact that Mr. Gunu feels compelled to presume to be speaking for each and every citizen and/or inhabitant of the Volta Region is, of course, what is most insulting about his very stance. In sum, it is almost as if in the opinion of Mr. Gunu, Voltaians/Voltaics lack the requisite cognitive wherewithal to decide on either which parliamentary candidates and/or party to vote for.
It is also interesting and quite significant to note that while, indeed, the majority of voters in the three Northern Regions have been routinely voting in support of the National Democratic Congress, absolutely nobody claiming either to be an NDC activist or the campaign operative of any individual politician – or parliamentarian – from the North has picked up a megaphone or microphone and gone about screaming at the people of the three Northern Regions to remind them of the party they have perennially and invariably been voting for over the past two decades and counting.
It also constitutes the very height of arrogance, if not downright foolhardiness, for Mr. Gunu to declare that “in the 2012 elections, [the] NDC would take back the only constituency [in the Volta Region of] Nkwanta-North [which] was [ceded] to the New Patriotic Party in the 2004 and 2008 elections.” Maybe somebody ought to remind the Adjaho lackey that the Volta Region is neither ideologically nor ethnically homogeneous. And neither do all residents and citizens of the Volta Region think like Mr. Gunu and his NDC faux-socialist fellow travelers.
It may also do Mr. Gunu great good to be reminded of the fact that nobody “ceded” Nkwanta-North to the New Patriotic Party in the 2004 and 2008 elections. Rather, the people of Nkwanta-North, having critically examined their practical relationship with either of the country’s two major political parties, made the all-too-wise decision of casting their lot with the now-opposition New Patriotic Party, which they clearly recognized to best represent their interests.
Personally, my prediction is that knowing what we know about the Woyome “Gorgormi” grand larceny that has become the hallmark of the ruling National Democratic Congress, more constituencies in the Volta Region are very likely to massively vote to cast their lot, and along with the latter their destiny, with the fiscally far more responsible and development-oriented New Patriotic Party, come Election 2012. The fact of the matter is that there are decent and responsible residents and citizens in the Volta Region. And then there are indecent and arm-twisting thugs like Mr. James Gunu, who would rather blindly back career politicians in creaming off the commonwealth of our august Republic and callously milking the indigent and the destitute.
In any case, what makes Mr. Gunu, who strongly and religiously believes that the Volta Region is the especial and perpetual preserve of the NDC, also think that retaining the embattled Mr. Doe Adjaho, as first speaker of Ghana’s Parliament, would not only be good for the Volta Region, but that it would also curiously, somehow, be good for our nation at large? What chutzpah! What arrogance! What savagery!

*Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D., is Associate Professor of English, Journalism and Creative Writing at Nassau Community College of the State University of New York, Garden City. He is Director of The Sintim-Aboagye Center for Politics and Culture and author of “Ghanaian Politics Today” (Lulu.com, 2008). E-mail: [email protected].
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