Sorry, Mr President, it has now gone beyond a joke!

Kobena A Eyiah

What exactly is the top priority of the President of the Republic of Ghana, Mr John Dramani Mahama? Why is his government bringing the name, ”Ghana” and the people who inhabit that entity into such disrepute?

Why does he continue to embarrass Ghanaians living everywhere? What exactly constitutes a security threat to the nation Ghana these days?

As a result of one of the most stupid policies ever made by any Ghanaian government, aka “I shall legalise ‘galamsey’ if you vote me into power”, by a government of which he was part, crass illiterate Chinese miners have seized large territories in parts of the Central, Western, Ashanti and Eastern Regions of Ghana with simple World War II vintage rifles and are terrorising ordinary citizens in those areas like nobody’s business. Life-sustaining surface and groundwater bodies in those areas have been killed or dying. Those that are not dead already have been polluted beyond the lowest international levels of water safety.

These Chinese and other illegal foreign miners have become a law unto themselves, destroying farmers’ cocoa plantations and other cash crops. Our national security services are either impotent in the face of these provocations or else condoning those criminal activities, obviously for their own selfish ends. Our president does not seem to care a hoot about these damnable activities.

Ordinary Fulani herdsmen have also taken over parts of the Ashanti and Volta Regions and wreaking havoc on citizens of those areas with impunity. Again the national security agencies cannot or are not willing to lift a finger.
As retribution for his brother’s illegal use of a rented American-owned aircraft, the Americans have either bullied or blackmailed our president into taking in two hardened rogues belonging to the most dangerous and vicious terrorist organisation that has emerged on the world scene since the demise of the Palestine Liberation Organisation.

Embarrassingly, the President’s top foreign affairs adviser and chief of internal security have declared publicly and individually that they were excluded from the crucial discussions involving the importation of these terror suspects into our country. And now their relatives and friends are threatening to descend on our country. That is if they have not already done so, judging from the fact that all the dealings concerning the Guantanamo duo have been shrouded in secrecy.

With respect to the national economy and how much the nation Ghana owes in total, the president is giving us one figure, the Minister of Finance is giving another, while the Governor of the Central Bank has a completely different figure. How very embarrassing.

In the face of all these cock-ups, our president (and the buck stops with him!) cannot even supervise a simple independence anniversary brochure, the grammar, comprehension and the generality of that document which cost the Ghanaian taxpayer an arm and a leg, has probably made my Class Six teacher cringe in his grave!

Then there are children in the president’s own backyard who lie on their stomachs on dusty floors to take dictation from semi-literate teachers. Habah! What do we pay this band of ministers and propagandists for?
Every primary school child in Ghana knows by now that Ghana’s electoral register is dangerously bloated and not fit for purpose. With a population 25 million in 2010, just about 14 million of whom are aged 18 years or older, the new Electoral Commissioner announces with a sheepish grin that “there are only a few thousand duplications in the 18 million strong electoral register!”

Ministers of state continue to lie through their teeth about every matter ranging from classroom chairs to the size of a ball of kenkey at Fadama Market.

As if these issues are not embarrassing enough, our president has now taken to using the national security agencies to harass fellow citizens and his political opponents, the very people whose taxes maintain these goons at great expense, for doing absolutely nothing.

Did the president and his security gurus hear one of his party leaders threatening that the opposition NPP party leader, “Nana Akufo-Addo will die before June 2016?” What exactly did they do about it? Members of his party have murdered fellow citizens, while others have run their vehicles into processions without so much as their being invited by the police for questioning.
In view of this history of covering wrong-doing by the president’s party, why will anybody blame the NPP for making the effort to protect its flagbearer? The president, his aids and those half-baked, so-called “security experts” may not realise it, but the jeopardised safety of Nana Akufo-Addo constitutes a much greater danger to the security of our country than Boko Haram, Al Qaeda in Cote d’Ivoire or even the Guantanamo duo!
Interestingly, all leftist governments of Ghana have at one time or the other, used the security agencies to harass innocent citizens they do not like and those who criticise their governments as well as their political opponents.

Two of my relations served in the old Special Branch in the late 1960s and early 70s. Such finer offices you could never find anywhere in the world. And it was a real professional organisation. Why has this government run everything aground?

As if these and other incompetently handled national issues are not bad enough the president has now taken to harassing other Africans. What exactly did the three ex-South African police officers do wrong, breaching the conditions of their visas? How about the thousands of Chinese and other foreign nationals roaming the countryside? Did that really require armed security officers? What happened to the immigration service? I hope the president heard what the South African mobs did to Ghanaians and Nigerians in their country after a few of their citizens were molested in Nigeria. Ironically, with the current mishandling of our national economy into the lowest pit, there are probably more illegal Ghanaian workers in South Africa than citizens of any country in the world. Let us hope that the South African security forces are more professional and less corrupt than ours!
Oh, and the President says as a son of Jakpa he does not fear guns. Next time he goes to South Africa to see to his piles or earache, he should make sure he takes as large a contingent of Jakpa fighters as his plane can carry!