AN OPEN LETTER TO LINKEDIN!

Dear LinkedIn,

I received, for the third time or so (I believe!), notification from a Tara Marinello of LA. And on each occasion, I have ignored it, because I suspect it is a trap - meant to trip me up.

I would be grateful if you could find out if such an individual truly exists in your network. I neither know, nor wish to know, any such individual. Period.

Some members of our corrupt ruling elite in my native Ghana, have consistently sent me bogus entrapment emails and planted many spurious stories on www.ghanaweb.com, in the hope that one would fall for their perfidy, and comment on it by writing one of one's acerbic pieces about the corruption and abuse of power by some of the members of our ruling elites - and fall flat on one's face: as they sued one through the courts, to destroy one's credibility, and shut one up permanently that way, as no one would then take one seriously after that.

It would be a terrible development, if Ghana's wealthy criminals and the few crooks amongst the many decent people who rule Ghana (and are so typical of the powerful and ruthless types who dominate much of life in so many of the nations on the continent of Africa, and whose national economies they ruthlessly exploit for their own benefit, with complete impunity), could misuse the internet, by infiltrating reputable social networks, such as LinkedIn, to deny ordinary citizen-journalists like myself (and they still shouldn't be allowed to get away with it, were one only a mere poor old semi-literate villager to boot, too!), from exercising my constitutional right to freedom of expression, and to contribute to the national fight against corruption in my homeland Ghana (waged by civil society groups and patriotic individuals).

Please work together with the LA Police Department to unravel this mystery.

It is important, if my suspicions are correct, that you expose those powerful people in places like Ghana (and elsewhere in Africa!), who seek to deny law-abiding citizens the right to speak their minds freely (by blogging online), through a conspiracy to use subterfuge to achieve their dubious ends: with the aid of your well-regarded online platform.

I deeply resent the attempt to use subterfuge to entrap me and eventually muzzle me that way.

I am not a criminal - so why should anyone hound me in such outrageous fashion, I ask? Criticising the third-rate individuals amongst those who rule us, and their mercenary and unprincipled allies in the Ghanaian media, does not, and must not, make me a public enemy and a danger to the security of the Ghanaian nation-state.

On the contrary, open criticism of those who rule us, and holding them accountable for their actions, can only strengthen Ghanaian democracy - and make our nation a better place for us all.
Please find the said suspect communication below:

" LinkedIn
REMINDER

This pending invitation is awaiting your response:

•  From Tara Marinello"

Many thanks in advance, for your help.

Best wishes,

Kofi.

Tel(powered by Tigo - the one mobile phone network in Ghana that actually works!): +233 (0) 27 745 3109.