“Do not imagine comrades, that leadership is a pleasure! On the contrary, it is a deep and heavy responsibility “.
Squealer: Animal Farm
“If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear”.
George Orwell: 1984
THE 8- YEAR RULE (2008 – 2016) of the NDC has been benevolent, charitable and benign for some Ghanaians. Young men and women who just left school, some without doing their national service, have had great opportunities, rising to become deputy ministers, Ministers, Members of Parliament, District Chief Executives- you name them – enjoying the goodies that go with such high- profile offices.
A young man who just left University would be head of a meeting sitting at a table with his quondam lecturers and professors, giving them instructions on how to administer the University, and his petty cash of GH¢ 20,000 (Two hundred million old cedis) would get missing from his V.8 sent for washing! Juicy contracts have gone to well-positioned relations, friends, classmates and colleagues. People have been paid undeserved judgment debts. Why envy them? ‘Man mo yee’ (Man must eat).
Some artistes (‘concert’ men, music makers, and jokers) have been rewarded with V.8 Methinks, V.8 saloon or 4X4 is the least of the offers one can receive for switching camp and berthing at the NDC. Thus, the NDC is or should be attractive to young men and women. If they had been in other parties, especially NPP, they would have to be in a long queue. They would have been told to give way to old fuddy-daddies who must have helped to build the party without enjoying an iota of the sweetness of the pudding, save for the 2–year Busia rule and the 8-year period of Kufuor, out of the 60 years post-independence Ghana when they were on the periphery.
Other people have passed through hell, in these times, some having been edged out of their offices because they had names and faces that were not commensurate with the ilk and colour of the NDC membership. When in the 60s, K. Gyasi sang a song complaining to the legendary Atwima Mansa about the plight of her sons and daughters, the song was taken off the playlist because it was nauseating to hear of anyone complaining under Nkrumah’s one-party state. The opposition had been ousted, and all Ghanaians had become CPP members, and there were Akosombo Dam, 400 factories, Workers Brigade, Young Pioneers, and Ramblers’ Band was playing ‘Work and Happiness’. To the inner core CPP members, ‘democracy’ was defined as ‘Di bi ma menni bi (eat, let me eat). The all-time sensational singer, Ampadu, released a very scintillating song: Ebi Te Yie’. As was the custom of that time, the song was centred on animals, and this one was about a meeting in the animal world. A small rodent was not well situated, sitting by the giant of the forest, the tiger. The rodent asked: ‘Petition please’, ‘point of order’; he called for an end of the meeting because it was not all the animals that were well –positioned. Otwe Agyanka had been pinned to his seat by the huge paws of the tiger.
The Ghanaian masses knew those who were suffering under Dr Kwame Nkrumah, just before February 1966. An impecunious verandah boy would have come from his village and perched on the verandah of the benefactor. After associating with the CPP and shouting ‘twooboi’, the Verandah Boy’ would rise and be so well-off, he could afford to own as many as 30 houses.
Akosua’s cartoon in the Daily Guide of someone who looked like President Mahama in a helicopter as against the one who looked like Nana Addo swimming to go to campaigns is a picturesque summary of the situation in Ghana now. So, President Mahama can afford to travel round the country in a helicopter? Are the roads too bad for his entourage in V.8s, numbering over 100 in some cases? And the huge bill boards. Who would not defend his position? The fat bills have to be paid for and there is the need to collect more taxes and acquire more loans. Do we need to talk of corruption? Inflated prices, over-blown contracts, phantom projects and the like. Is it not mind-boggling? It evokes the incidence of ‘pseudobulbar affect’ which is characterized by involuntary crying and laughing. ‘Cry the Beloved Country’ (Alan Paton) or ‘Search Sweet Country’ (Kojo Laing).
In the political fable by George Orwell, ‘Animal Farm’, a group of animals rebel against humans from ‘Manor Farm’, and run it by themselves hoping to ensure social justice, freedom and happiness. As time wears on, the new rule is transformed into a cruel tyranny led by the pigs, headed by fierce – looking Napoleon: The 7 commandments are promulgated: Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy. Whatever goes upon four legs or has wings is a friend. No animal shall sleep in a bed. No animal shall drink alcohol. No animal shall kill any other animal. All animals are equal. With time, Napoleon would brooch no opposition. Any animal who did not agree with Napoleon is eaten up by his dogs. Any mishap on the farm is blamed on Snowball who has been chased out. They later come into contact with Mr Jones, and start to walk on their hind legs. The old maxims are changed into new ones: ‘Four legs good, two legs better; ‘All Animals are equal, but some are more equal than others’
The story of ‘Animal Farm’ is re – told here, as an allegorical episode that reflects our present – day situation: the ‘haves’ and the ‘have – nots’: who are they? The politically suave propagandists (call them ‘smart guys’) will be using chicanery and sophistry to persuade the politically naive. Kenneth Minogue is not kind to the political naivete whom he describes as ‘foolish’. In Shakespeare’s ‘Hamlet’, Polonius says of Ophelia: “… you speak like a green girl unsifted in such perilous circumstances. Do you believe his tenders as he calls them?” Do Ghanaians believe in Mahama’s ‘tenders’? Compared with Awal Mohammed who switched from NDC to NPP, Akua Donkor is smarter for leaving her own party and aligning herself with the fabulously rich NDC. But whose money is being used so carelessly here? Mine, yours, ours– being dissipated on stooges and sycophants!
Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, the Asantehene, has sounded a note of caution to chiefs in his kingdom. Anyone who wants to meddle in politics should put down the stool. It will be better for such chiefs to destool themselves. Of course, he berated the Electoral Commission of not applying rigidly the Political Parties Law, Act 574, and registering those which have no offices in all the 10 regions of Ghana; those not organised in at least two thirds of the districts in the country; and those which have not submitted audited accounts to it.
Of course a chief cannot refuse Schnapps from a politician who knocks at his door. He has to pour libation, he has to send the page boys on errands but such chiefs should distinguish between gifts and bribe, the latter of which can take many forms: V8s, promise of schools, hospitals, roads and other attractive freebies. The fawning nature of some of our chiefs is all too obvious. Those who with servile smile would cringe before the president and behave obsequiously, or fatuously embrace him “… till like a boy you see him cringe his face and whine aloud for… “(unquote: Shakespeare’s ‘Anthony and Cleopatra’).
Why should anybody lament when Voltaire had warned us: “It is difficult to free fools from the chains they revere”?
Join GhanaStar.com to receive daily email alerts of breaking news in Ghana. GhanaStar.com is your source for all Ghana News. Get the latest Ghana news, breaking news, sports, politics, entertainment and more about Ghana, Africa and beyond.