Mills Award, NPP's Anger & Human Rights

The New National Democrat has been monitoring events following the decision of President J.A. Kufuor to bestow the nation's highest honour on the former Vice-President, J.E.A. Mills. The reactions coming from some NPP activists and groups in opposition to the award is very interesting indeed. We are glad at the level of opposition to this honour and the mindset of the NPP of seeing the Presidency of Ghana as a party one and not a national institution, reconciliation is up in arms.

The other day it was that political upstart called John Boadu, who waded into the imbroglio with some asinine outbursts. On his part, he referred to human rights abuses at the seat of government when Atta-Mills was the Vice President. It is important for us all to be guided by the truth. If we assume that everything that happens in the Castle is known to President Kufuor and Aliu Mahama, then we are ready to heap all the ignominious cases at the seat of power on the head of the two men.

The New National Democrat wishes to ask the NPP activists promising fire and brimstone whether they were in Ghana when Mrs.Naadu Mills, the wife of Atta-Mills, was physically harassed and on the brink of being forcibly thrown out of her car by NPP Security goons? Of course, the trauma she suffered did not deserve the sympathy of the human rights hypocrites in the NPP. What is more, this happened at a time the so-called chief apostle of human rights was Ghana's Attorney-General and Minister of Justice. If Akufo Addo believes in human rights, why did he not render apology to the wife of the former Vice President?

Our ears have been inundated with issues of dictatorship, human rights abuses and what have you. When Osafo Maafo personally prevented David Adom, former Commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) from attending an internation conference of tax experts being held in Accra, did it not constitute an infringement of his fundamental human rights? David Adom has been a paid up member of this organization but Maafo treated it as if it was his Akyem-Awisa family union. On that occasion, it took Atta-Mills to intervene and ensure that Osafo Maafo's intolerance was not allowed to infringe on the rights of others.

When the former Auditor-General, Prempeh was arrested in Church on a Sunday by NPP Security Forces, what was the reaction of Akufo Addo? What about the attempted arrest of Tsatsu Tsikata in church too? Hypocrites! The definition of human rights is very simplistic. Its main vitality in a democracy is premised on the NPP's own interpretation and understanding. The Chief Priest and defender of human rights, Akufo-Addo, had his watchman pronounced dead in his office on Sunday June 4, 1995. Before the autopsy was completed, he had managed to obtain a burial certificate and also swapped the original grave of Justice Ghann. But his people continue to hum the human rights tune, blocking our ears to our consternation.

The reference to human rights suits us most. Dr. Kofi Abrefa Busia, the UP/PP/NPP foremost liberalist was known to be an autocrat with enormous Napoleonic complex. His commitment to human rights is known to be legendary in the eyes of the NPP apostles of political sagacity. His denial of economic survival to workers of certain tribal and political orientation which became known as the Apollo 568 was a mark of human rights!

Even Mike Oquaye, in spite of the trash in his book titled “Politics in Ghana 1972-1979 had his mental stability of thought process spat on when he wrote of his political mentor:

… upon taking office, the Busia government dismissed 568 civil servants and wrongfully rejected the Supreme Court's decision that the government's powers in this connection were limited to offices established by the National Liberation Council (N.L.C.). There was also a genuine concern that in some cases some opponents of the Progress Party were targeted and eliminated and that the occasion was also used to settle personal and tribal scores (1980: 186).

This is Oquaye on UP/NLM/NPP politics. We have said enough and would not want to bore our readers with more examples. However, we want to place on record that Prof. Atta-Mills is a man of mettle. He is not given to intellectual garbage as Mike Oquaye has demonstrated under the aegis of political expediency. As for the ilk of John Boadu, we can only say our politics has been reduced to picnic on the lawn because most men of substance and sharp political intellect have shied away from entering it because of such nitwits. In the case of the NPP women's wing, we admit that they are only letting out hot air. They have every right to do so. We expect more from them, particularly the need to object to some of their members indulging in cocaine trafficking. The case of their members in the Dzorwulu wing of the party namely Abena Foriwaa, Chairperson, Comfort Akua Amankwaa, Organiser and Ama Nyarkoa, Treasurer would do them a lot of good and give true meaning to their resistance to things they considered inimical to the growth of the elephant. The NPP activists and some of their leaders have demonstrated to the international community that President Kufuor deserves to be rather called President of NPP and not Ghana.

The New National Democrat cannot speak for Prof. Atta-Mills. We believe in his wisdom to weigh his options. With his wealth of experience, we do acknowledge his shrewdness in being able to deal with controversy. We know Atta-Mills is a unifier. We know he is not an over-ambitious person. For him, politics is not one of life and death. His philosophy on politics and national discourse as one of the contestation of ideas, remains unwavering. What is deserving of honour is not the symbolic gesture of a medal dangled around his neck but the overriding interest to redeem the people from the shackles of poverty and unemployment.