WHO ARE THOSE NDC MEMBERS THAT GHANA’S VICE PRESIDENT JOHN MAHAMA SAYS HOLD MEETINGS ON SUNDAYS – AND WILL THEY HAVE THE COURAGE TO OUST HIM SOMEDAY?

As Ghana’s Vice President John Mahama waded into the argument about the use of our oil and natural gas revenues as collateral for loans to build our infrastructure, I wondered, yet again, at the calibre of the people around him. I asked myself, why, when he was in South Korea, those around him, did not advise him to try and convince the South Korean government to provide funding from the KITM Global Infrastructure Fund, to South Korean firms, to build, operate, and transfer motorways (of the Accra –Tema type that Nkrumah built), as well as railway lines to all our regional capitals – and in return get long tax holidays for all earned revenues covering the entire period they would build, own, and operate such motorways and railway lines (before finally transferring them to the Ghanaian nation-state)? Surely that would be a creative way of getting modern roads and railway lines built across the length and breadth of Ghana, without recourse to our oil and gas revenues – if Ghana’s politicians cannot put aside partisanship and agree on exactly what to do with those revenues?

As a wag said to me recently: “Massa, it is very difficult to point out exactly what John Mahama has brought to the table, since he became Ghana’s vice president." Well, for those of us who said that even though he happens to be well-liked by people from across the political spectrum, John Mahama could not possibly make a good vice president to a mild-mannered President Mills (because the president needed someone with a more ruthless streak in him – and able to reach out to all the factions in their party: because he or she is politically acceptable to all the centres of power in the National Democratic Congress (NDC)), that cynical remark does have a gem of truth in it. I have always been of the view that the next president of our nation, after President Mills, must be from the north of Ghana – because the people of the north also deserve to have a president who hails from that part of our country. However, John Mahama would be wise to retire whenever President Mills’ tenure ends – and support another northerner from the NDC to serve our country as president after President Mills. It will be a sacrificial act that will help unite his party.

I will not hide the fact that in a sense I have lost any admiration I had for John Mahama – and I say so with much regret and sadness. But as someone from a long-standing organic cocoa-farming family (which has been in the industry continuously since 1915!), I was dismayed and pretty livid, to hear him saying that he had only asked those British politicians and officials who approached him to intervene on Amajaro’s behalf, to get Amajaro to write a petition to the Ghana Cocoa Board (COCBOD0). Did it not occur to him that as Ghana’s vice president it was his duty to tell them that cocoa was of such importance to Ghana’s economy that any company caught smuggling bags of cocoa could not be allowed to continue trading in that all-important commodity? I do hope that those whom he says are holding meetings on Sundays will make sure that he is forced to retire with President Mills when the president’s tenure ends. The question is: Will they have the courage to do so when the time comes? One hopes that they will – for all our sake. A word to the wise…

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