Nerquaye-Tetteh’s Love Letter to Nsawam Prison

*By Akadu Ntiriwa Mensema, Ph. D.

** Dedicated to Col. Roger J. Felli who was killed by Rawlings and his lunatics for
taking a legal loan of 50, 000 “old” cedis to build a house in his hometown. Today we are not ashamed that Rawlings and his wife own Nsawam Cannery and have put
pressure on the NDC to rebuild their arsoned Ridge state property. Today we are not ashamed that Kufour and his son own a multi-million dollar hotel. And today we are not ashamed that some “tribal” groups are championing Woyome’s fraud of GH¢58million as the work of “the illustrious son.”

“The EOCO report said Mr. Nerquaye-Tetteh was the Chief State Attorney directly in charge of the Woyome case. [Nerquaye-Tetteh] admits that he drafted all the letters… concerning the transactions leading to the payments to Mr. Woyome…” (Ghanaweb Feb 4 2012).

“The EOCO report uncovered… that Woyome had paid a gigantic amount of GH¢400, 000 (¢4billion) into Gifty Nerquaye-Tetteh’s account” [after he had been paid
GH¢58million]” (Ghanaweb Feb 9, 2012).

“Samuel Nerquaye-Tetteh [writes that] ‘My only crime is that I allowed my wife to accept help from Mr. Woyome with regard to her business’” (Ghanaweb March 3, 2012).

The Nerquaye-Tettehs
Oh! The elitist pen-robbers
Killers of the dream
Of our postcolonial dreams
Of managing our own affairs
Of our eternal self-sufficiency
Of Africanizing independence
Nerquaye-Tetteh steals from us
Sends us a sweet love letter
Wrapped in missiles of lies
To numb our national pain

Massa! Ah! We dey meet again
My Son, Ah! Our life dey cross
Massa Ghanafo dey for the cross
Useless Mills no dey carry cross
Hmm! Massa, Ghana hard paa
Eh! Ghana good for some oh
Yes for the Nerquaye-Tettehs
Son, that man be pen-thief
Oh! Yes, pen-armed robber
Yes, Nerquaye-Tetteh be thief
Massa, we for jail them all
They make us suffer suffer
Even kill them like JJ kill Felli
My son Col. Felli died in vain

Ah! Nerquaye-Tetteh
The pen-armed robber
Uses his bloody pen
Ah! Write to all of us
Love letter of dishonesty
Love letter of deceit
Ah! His letter of conceit
Just like indebting his wife
His collateral wife, his pawn
Prostituted to greedy Woyome
Gifting Gifty to greedy Woyome
Oh! For the gift of ten percent
Poured into Gifty’s ACCOUNT

Samuel Nerquaye-Tetteh
Put up his wife for sale
Pawned his wife as pawn
Indebted to Woyome
The pawn-credit to steal
Samuel Nerquaye-Tetteh
Steal millions of our cedis
Steely writes us love letters

The Nerquaye-Tettehs
The pen-armed robbers
The delirious foes
The vultures among us
That carcass our bodies
To feed on our body-politic
The vultures take us for fools
To canonize their thievery
As a right
As a birthright
As rite of their right
Elites who exploit us
Elites who imprison us
The impoverished
The marginalized
The disempowered

Let us jail them, all of them
Jail the Nerquaye-Tettehs
Elitist thieves who regal us
With brilliant love letters
Of selling their wives
Brilliant lies
Let us treat them
Treat them like pests
Like sanguinary pests
The educated thieves
Who have caused us pain
Made us a laughing-stock
Let us treat them
Treat them like pests
Like sanguinary pests
Blood-thirsty pests
Like Korle mosquitoes

*Akadu Ntiriwa Mensema, Ph. D., is a nationalist Denkyira beauty. She is a trained
oral historian cum sociologist and Professor in the USA. She lives in Pennsylvania
with her great mentor and teaches Africa-area studies at a college in Maryland. In
her pastime, she writes what critics have called “populist hyperbolic, satirical”
poetry. She can be reached at [email protected]