I was astonished to hear some of the reasons Dr. Arthur Kennedy gave on Metro TV’s “Good Morning Ghana” breakfast show (telecast on Monday 17th November 2008), in seeking to justify the president’s unnecessary trips abroad.
How can that gentleman possibly say that the president had to travel to the country’s which forgave Ghana’s external debt, because (to paraphrase him) the people, who forgave us the debt, don’t live in Ghana? Does Dr. Arthur Kennedy seriously think that those nations that forgave us our debt did so because of President Kufuour’s endless and unnecessary travels abroad?
Perhaps Dr. Kennedy has come to believe in his own party’s never-ending dissimulation? Well, in case he does not realise it, his party, like most of our largely clueless political class, neither had the nous or the gumption, in the 1990’s, when some of us were fighting for debt relief (because we believed, correctly, that that was the only way that our economies could ever experience sustained growth), to join us in the fight to get our country (and others like it, across Africa!) a fresh start: and a fighting chance at achieving sustained economic growth.
The truth of the matter is that they are mere beneficiaries of other people’s steadfastness, foresight and creative thinking. Yet, today, the greed of the powerful few crooks who dominate his party, and who have benefitted enormously from the large debt they have succeeded in piling up again, has ended up taking us right back to square one.
We are now more or less suffering from the same “debt distress” that was squeezing the very lifeblood out of our country during the tenure of the previous regime and before our debts were cancelled - yet, this latter-day Goebbels seeks to put a spin on this outrage. Incredible!
He also talked (smoothly and glibly as he is wont to do!) about the public procurement law, now in place, as yet another achievement of his party. What effrontery!
Is he not the recipient of a contract awarded without public tendering from the ministry of health, as we speak - something that flies in the face of that very law: and a contract that no ethical politician in any nation whose public life is underpinned by an ethos of common decency, in his position (and in the course of an election campaign to boot, too!) would have accepted or sought?
Was it not simply a cynical way for his party to provide him with income at Ghana’s expense - because his party had to compensate him for staying on in Ghana to help in their election campaign (after his failed bid for his party’s presidential candidature), rather than returning to his work in the US?
And to cap all that nonsense on bamboo stilts, that insufferable and arrogant Steven Asamoah-Boateng, then called in to the programme, to tell us that Zoomlion was all over Ghana - cleaning the country. Does that uncouth buffoon not ever go out - and if he does, is he so blind that he is unable to see that our towns and cities are slowly being engulfed by filth? What perfidy!
Do they not understand that even the dimmest Ghanaians know that Zoomlion is their regime’s equivalent of the NDC regime’s leading and favourite, regime-crony oligarch’s "ordained-and-blessed" private-sector company, J. Stanley Owusu and Co.?
Does he not know that we all know that it was created when his party hit on the bright idea of creating their own contractors, to whom contracts could be awarded in exchange for kickbacks - as we were duly informed by no less a person than one of their party’s many ex-chairpersons, Mr. Haruna Esseku? Just what do some of our politicians take us for? Fools? God give us patience!
Hmmm, Ghana – enti yeawiye paa, enia? Asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
Monday, 17 November 2008
MARKING THE 2008 IMPRISONED WRITER’S DAY - THE THREAT TO FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION STILL PERSISTS IN GHANA!
Whereas in the past many writers were harassed and some even jailed, today’s methods are far more subtle: the powerful rogues amongst our rulers, have simply bought the conscience of many once-critical writers – and as a consequence, today, sadly, far too many writers are in the pockets of those who rule our homeland Ghana.
Thus, today, we are all witnesses to the unedifying spectacle, of many media professionals and media houses, who are supposed to be society's watchdogs, who have ended up becoming the ruling regime's guard-dogs.
The truth of the matter is that both the methods of yesteryear and today's methods are designed to achieve exactly the same end - kill freedom of expression in our country: in order to stop the truth about the abuse of power and corruption in high places from coming to light.
Nothing really has changed in the Ghanaian nation-state - the powerful crooks who have dominated all the regimes we have had ruling us since the return of constitutional rule in 1992, have all been out to stifle dissenting opinion in our country: to enable them “chop Ghana, small” (to quote an infamous phrase, immortalized by a prosperous Lebanese crook, who was in the lucrative business, of the rip-off, of our country) with impunity. Pity!
Hmmm. Ghana - enti yeawiye paa, enia? Asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
Thus, today, we are all witnesses to the unedifying spectacle, of many media professionals and media houses, who are supposed to be society's watchdogs, who have ended up becoming the ruling regime's guard-dogs.
The truth of the matter is that both the methods of yesteryear and today's methods are designed to achieve exactly the same end - kill freedom of expression in our country: in order to stop the truth about the abuse of power and corruption in high places from coming to light.
Nothing really has changed in the Ghanaian nation-state - the powerful crooks who have dominated all the regimes we have had ruling us since the return of constitutional rule in 1992, have all been out to stifle dissenting opinion in our country: to enable them “chop Ghana, small” (to quote an infamous phrase, immortalized by a prosperous Lebanese crook, who was in the lucrative business, of the rip-off, of our country) with impunity. Pity!
Hmmm. Ghana - enti yeawiye paa, enia? Asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
Alex Amoako-Atta: Kofi Thompson Is Neither Too Thick To Think, Nor Too Blind To See!
With respect, Opanin, I only responded to Mr. Benjamin Tawiah’s article entitled: “Rawlings’ Caucasian Blood Helped His Integrity: Says Nigerian Author” which you mentioned, and which appeared in the general news web page of www.ghanaweb.com on 16th November, 2008, for one reason only.
Massa, I commented on it, simply because the gentleman who wrote it, said he was a “freelance journalist.” Opanin, I was merely doing my duty by him, in pointing out his error to him - as a concerned fellow-journalist.
Yes, I agree with you perfectly Opanin, in what you say, when you imply that it is important that those who comment publicly on issues that affect the well-being of our country, are not needlessly partisan in the opinions they express.
However, I am not biased in my writing at all, in my humble opinion - and there are countless articles of mine in the public domain, to prove that I am not partisan when I write: especially as regards the issue of corruption amongst our political class.
For example, in the past, I have pointed out the fact that it is patently clear to all discerning and independent-minded Ghanaians, today, that if those who rescued the hero of 4th June, 1979, from his Special Branch cell at dawn, on the morning of 4th June, 1979, had had the slightest inkling, that nearly two decades down the road, Flt. Lt. Rawlings, would be telling Ghanaians the astonishing story, that "friends" of his, were paying for the education and living expenses, overseas, of his children, they would have definitely left him to his own devices - to face the music for his failed insurrection of 9th May, 1979, alone.
Massa, I am quiet sure that if you were to ask Major Boakye-Djan today, he would, indeed, confirm what I say!
I have also said publicly, that after the military uprising in 1979, if General Acheampong (may his soul rest in peace) and the other senior officers who were executed by the former president and his colleagues, who formed the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC), had said that "friends" of theirs were making the same kind of payments that the former president now tells us his "friends" are on his (General Akyeampong's) behalf, Flt Lt Rawlings and Co would have been apoplectic - and probably summarily executed them on the spot: for telling them such a Kweku Ananse story.
Surely, that is not the sort of thing a biased writer (especially one writing the way I did in my response to Mr. Benjamin Tawiah's piece), in a land full of sycophants, would write publicly, is it, Opanin?
Massa, I am a simple pan-Africanist, a humble Nkrumaist, a committed Ghanaian patriot and nationalist - not one of those "My-party-my-tribe-right-or-wrong" myrmidons, who wear blinkers permanently: and are too thick to think and too blind to see, because their consciences have been bought by our political class (from across the spectrum). Peace and blessings to you, Opanin.
Hmmm, Ghana – enti yeawiaye paa enia? Asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
Massa, I commented on it, simply because the gentleman who wrote it, said he was a “freelance journalist.” Opanin, I was merely doing my duty by him, in pointing out his error to him - as a concerned fellow-journalist.
Yes, I agree with you perfectly Opanin, in what you say, when you imply that it is important that those who comment publicly on issues that affect the well-being of our country, are not needlessly partisan in the opinions they express.
However, I am not biased in my writing at all, in my humble opinion - and there are countless articles of mine in the public domain, to prove that I am not partisan when I write: especially as regards the issue of corruption amongst our political class.
For example, in the past, I have pointed out the fact that it is patently clear to all discerning and independent-minded Ghanaians, today, that if those who rescued the hero of 4th June, 1979, from his Special Branch cell at dawn, on the morning of 4th June, 1979, had had the slightest inkling, that nearly two decades down the road, Flt. Lt. Rawlings, would be telling Ghanaians the astonishing story, that "friends" of his, were paying for the education and living expenses, overseas, of his children, they would have definitely left him to his own devices - to face the music for his failed insurrection of 9th May, 1979, alone.
Massa, I am quiet sure that if you were to ask Major Boakye-Djan today, he would, indeed, confirm what I say!
I have also said publicly, that after the military uprising in 1979, if General Acheampong (may his soul rest in peace) and the other senior officers who were executed by the former president and his colleagues, who formed the Armed Forces Revolutionary Council (AFRC), had said that "friends" of theirs were making the same kind of payments that the former president now tells us his "friends" are on his (General Akyeampong's) behalf, Flt Lt Rawlings and Co would have been apoplectic - and probably summarily executed them on the spot: for telling them such a Kweku Ananse story.
Surely, that is not the sort of thing a biased writer (especially one writing the way I did in my response to Mr. Benjamin Tawiah's piece), in a land full of sycophants, would write publicly, is it, Opanin?
Massa, I am a simple pan-Africanist, a humble Nkrumaist, a committed Ghanaian patriot and nationalist - not one of those "My-party-my-tribe-right-or-wrong" myrmidons, who wear blinkers permanently: and are too thick to think and too blind to see, because their consciences have been bought by our political class (from across the spectrum). Peace and blessings to you, Opanin.
Hmmm, Ghana – enti yeawiaye paa enia? Asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
Sunday, 16 November 2008
Re: "Rawlings' Caucasian Blood Helped His Integrity: Says Nigerian Author."
Quote: "By Benjamin Tawiah: The author is a freelance journalist; he lives in Ottawa, Canada." End of quotation.
Exactly - the "author" does indeed live in faraway Canada not Ghana. Perhaps if he lived in Ghana he could have taken a short walk past the former president's Ridge residence - and counted the number of houses there: two, precisely. Not five!
One of the two very ordinary-looking houses, serves as his family's home - and the other his office. Massa, for the record, the former president does not live in "a plush complex boasting five houses." Period.
Massa, with respect, if you want to be taken seriously as a "freelance journalist", do endeavour to get your facts right - as it does your reputation no good at all to make such needless (and basic!) factual errors. That - and being fair and balanced, always - will get you far, in your chosen profession. So do take note of that, please. Haaba!
Finally, Opanin, may I humbly point it out to you, that there are many Africans (both in the continent, and in the Diaspora), who might say to you that Africans of the 21st century, ought to have enough self-belief, not to allow themselves to be influenced by those negative-minded Africans, whose own sense of inferiority, makes them deprecate everything African?
Opanin, there is no innate difference in intelligence between the races - and neither is there a scientific basis for suggesting or implying that race has anything to do with the level of personal integrity members of the different races that make up the one human race have. That is arrant nonsense as many factors go into shaping the character of indivuduals whatever their race might be.
Yes, there are some Africans who are less honest than the members of other races - just as there are some members of other races who are less honest than some Africans.
Massa, try and see beyond stereotypes - if you want to be a good “freelance journalist.” Is Botswana's ruling elite not as honest as that found in the developed nations of the Western world - such as that of Canada for example? Are they not Africans, too? Get it? Se mu ekotina abrokyire a, eyaa mu enje muhu endi kakra. Haaba. Hmmm, Ghana - eyeasem oo!
May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long freedom! Long live Ghana!
Exactly - the "author" does indeed live in faraway Canada not Ghana. Perhaps if he lived in Ghana he could have taken a short walk past the former president's Ridge residence - and counted the number of houses there: two, precisely. Not five!
One of the two very ordinary-looking houses, serves as his family's home - and the other his office. Massa, for the record, the former president does not live in "a plush complex boasting five houses." Period.
Massa, with respect, if you want to be taken seriously as a "freelance journalist", do endeavour to get your facts right - as it does your reputation no good at all to make such needless (and basic!) factual errors. That - and being fair and balanced, always - will get you far, in your chosen profession. So do take note of that, please. Haaba!
Finally, Opanin, may I humbly point it out to you, that there are many Africans (both in the continent, and in the Diaspora), who might say to you that Africans of the 21st century, ought to have enough self-belief, not to allow themselves to be influenced by those negative-minded Africans, whose own sense of inferiority, makes them deprecate everything African?
Opanin, there is no innate difference in intelligence between the races - and neither is there a scientific basis for suggesting or implying that race has anything to do with the level of personal integrity members of the different races that make up the one human race have. That is arrant nonsense as many factors go into shaping the character of indivuduals whatever their race might be.
Yes, there are some Africans who are less honest than the members of other races - just as there are some members of other races who are less honest than some Africans.
Massa, try and see beyond stereotypes - if you want to be a good “freelance journalist.” Is Botswana's ruling elite not as honest as that found in the developed nations of the Western world - such as that of Canada for example? Are they not Africans, too? Get it? Se mu ekotina abrokyire a, eyaa mu enje muhu endi kakra. Haaba. Hmmm, Ghana - eyeasem oo!
May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long freedom! Long live Ghana!
Friday, 14 November 2008
OUGHT NOT THE MINORITY BENCHES IN PARLIAMENT TO WAKE UP NOW FROM THEIR DEEP SLUMBER, FOR MOTHER GHANA’S SAKE?
According to a 14 November 2008 Ghana News Agency report, “Ghana's debt, including contingent liability from COCOBOD, at the end of last September stood at US$ 7,652.46 million, Dr Anthony Akoto Osei, a Minister of State at the Ministry of Finance has told Parliament.”
The same report went on to say that: ”The debt, he said, was made up of US$3,990.38 for external, including that of the COCOBOD of US$ 118.75 million, and a domestic debt of US$ 3,662.” (End of quotation from GNA report.)
That genius, Dr Anthony Akoto Osei , who is our minister of state at the ministry of finance, is a gentleman, who owes his cushy sinecure to the nepotism of our “Hypocrite-in-Chief ” - and his irritating, disgraceful and divisive “Kokofu-football” politics.
Well, knowing the tactics of the current crowd, now in power in our country today, one just hopes that the phrase COCOBOD's "contingent liability" is not a euphemism designed to hide any super-fat fees (surely not as much as US$ 118.75 millions?) charged by the consortium of overseas banks, which arranged a hard currency loan (was it not nearly a billion dollars or thereabouts - if my poor old memory serves me right?) for the COCOBOD to purchase cocoa, locally, with.
Anyway, there are a number of this regime’s critics, who say (uncharitably perhaps?), that Dr. Akoto Osei was sent to that ministry, to make sure that the powerful rogues who dominate this regime, would be able to take advantage of the many opportunities that come Ghana’s way, for empowering its private sector, from overseas - and keep his sponsors au fait with such golden opportunities: as well as generally smoothen the path of the regime-crony oligarchs in whose deep pockets some of our rulers are ensconced, as they work hard to send their personal net worth into the stratosphere.
Sadly, and as usual, the geniuses on the opposition benches in parliament, missed yet another opportunity to nail the rogues into whose hands our nation has fallen - and finally force them to tell all of us, precisely how much our now heavily-indebted nation, is having to make, in regular interest payments, to those prescient overseas investors, who piled into the US$ 750 millions sovereign bonds, this regime issued overseas.
They must now make amends and ask exactly what this regime's sovereign bond regular interest payment plan is: and precisely what all that money was used for. Above all , they must demand to know, if it was used to create wealth that will generate revenues for our country, going forward, into the future: or if it was merely used to fund the extravagant lifestyles of our rulers – such as supporting their wanderlust-addiction habit.
They must do the same thing, too, as regards the GT corporate bonds, issued in London, on that company’s behalf, by Iroko: in that most egregious of examples of insider-dealing ever seen in the history of corporate Ghana.
Whiles they are at it, they must also ask that very honest gentleman, to break down, item by item, the US$72 millions in "other costs" that not too long ago, he proposed to subtract from projected borrowed money (some US$300 plus to repay GT'S "debt", if my memory serves me right!).
Once upon a time, dear reader, they apparently intended to saddle this and future generations of Ghanaians and their country, with yet another loan - in the hope of getting their usual hard currency kickbacks, from their regime-crony oligarchs in our financial services sector (according to some of their critics, i.e.!).
This was before the global credit crunch (in the aftermath of the meltdown in the financial markets of the West), when they felt they were the masters of the universe - and were talking glibly about raising some US$300 plus millions in the capital markets of the West, to repay GT's "debt"!
Curiously (and to the astonishment of the foreign carpetbaggers, apparently!), it is rumoured that this government, was so desperate to seal the deal (no doubt to save their “blushes” – nudge, nudge, wink, wink!), that it took it upon itself, to remove from GT’s wealthy suitor’s massive shoulders, that debt, which Iroko inveigled GT into burdening itself with, when the greedy rogues in this regime, struck that infamous takeover deal.
Yet, as it became obvious to many, shortly after the deal, Iroko issued those bonds on GT's behalf, without the company's managers having any clear idea of a solid revenue stream-providing product, to guarantee that the company would still remain stable financially, even as the regular repayments, which had to be made to those clever overseas investors, who bought the bonds as a good source of regular income, were made. So why did our nation have to assume that debt too? Can it not be argued that Iroko was criminally negligent in its role as the issuing house, to a certain extent? Incredible!
Apparently (according to the bush telegraph, i.e.!), the local professional advisors of the foreign carpetbaggers, who bought that stake in the company, are rumoured to have only got their clients to agree to the deal, after they got the government to agree it would pass a law indemnifying them from any future prosecution - to protect people from their side from any collateral damage: in case regime-change occurred as a result of the December 2008 elections.
Poor fools: Why, were those super-expensive local corporate lawyers they hired and paid zillions to, not decent enough, to tell them, that far from conferring immunity on any unethical actions, that law actually is an illegality - as our constitution enjoins all Ghanaians to fight corruption: not aid and abet foreign carpetbaggers, out to rip-off mother Ghana? Amazing!
They will “smell pepper” one day, for sure - to use our "Hypocrite-in-Chief’s” favourite crude phrase: "deployed" when he is feeling on top of the world and thinks he is invincible because he is Commander-in-Chief of our military and monarch of all he surveys in our homeland Ghana. Poor soul!
What power did his predecessor not have, once upon a time, I ask, dear reader? At a certain point in time, was he not the hero of June 4th 1979, no less? Well, today, what power does that poor, angry old man with an unhealthy beer-paunch, have? Incidentally, forgetting that Napoleon Bonaparte was height-challenged too, our sadly now much-discredited hero of 4th June, 1979 apparently thinks that short people don’t amount to much!
But I digress, dear reader. If even the smallest primary school children in our country today, know that in issuing bonds overseas, one must always have a plan that clearly outlines the sources from whence bond-issuing parties intend making regular payments to investors who buy those bonds one issues, why then are our opposition parliamentarians not asking the right questions about our unacceptably large external debt today?
Exactly when are the geniuses on the opposition benches in parliament going to ask this incompetent regime, precisely what plans they had in place, to enable them meet the regular interest payments on both classes of bonds, so far issued overseas: i.e. the sovereign bonds and the GT corporate bonds (if that too was shifted unto our nation’s shoulders - in that “one-way-street” deal, i.e.!)?
Have the opposition members not heard the bush-telegraph story that some of the clever politicians ruling us today, took a strategic decision to use overseas loans and bond issues as their preferred personal wealth creation vehicle - garnering hard currency kickbacks from the super-fat fees earned by their cronies in Ghana's financial services sector: the politically well-connected "deal-makers"?
Do they not know that it is the process through which they are said to have received kickbacks from the regime-crony oligarchs, those well-connected and powerful Ghanaian financial services sector Titans, who are said to have shared their super-fat fees with them: which is why they have piled up so much debt in such a relatively short time, since they graduated from Chinese hairdressing salons in the seedy backstreets of London, to the piranha-infested waters of the capital markets of the West?
Let the opposition wake up from its slumber - and pose the right questions in parliament, for once. Henceforth, let the VALCO fiasco be their eternal guide - and act to protect the interests of our country, at all times, going forward, into the future. Haba!
Those of us who wrote publicly against the idea of hedging that was mooted by some of our geniuses, as a way to protect our country from the spikes in the price of oil, were aghast that the opposition did not point it out to the well-educated morons who came up with the idea, that that was what ruined the now-defunct Ashanti Goldfields, in the end. They must stop overlooking such lunacies, in future, too.
Hmmm, Ghana - eyeasem oo! Enti yeawiaye paa, enia? Asem eba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
The same report went on to say that: ”The debt, he said, was made up of US$3,990.38 for external, including that of the COCOBOD of US$ 118.75 million, and a domestic debt of US$ 3,662.” (End of quotation from GNA report.)
That genius, Dr Anthony Akoto Osei , who is our minister of state at the ministry of finance, is a gentleman, who owes his cushy sinecure to the nepotism of our “Hypocrite-in-Chief ” - and his irritating, disgraceful and divisive “Kokofu-football” politics.
Well, knowing the tactics of the current crowd, now in power in our country today, one just hopes that the phrase COCOBOD's "contingent liability" is not a euphemism designed to hide any super-fat fees (surely not as much as US$ 118.75 millions?) charged by the consortium of overseas banks, which arranged a hard currency loan (was it not nearly a billion dollars or thereabouts - if my poor old memory serves me right?) for the COCOBOD to purchase cocoa, locally, with.
Anyway, there are a number of this regime’s critics, who say (uncharitably perhaps?), that Dr. Akoto Osei was sent to that ministry, to make sure that the powerful rogues who dominate this regime, would be able to take advantage of the many opportunities that come Ghana’s way, for empowering its private sector, from overseas - and keep his sponsors au fait with such golden opportunities: as well as generally smoothen the path of the regime-crony oligarchs in whose deep pockets some of our rulers are ensconced, as they work hard to send their personal net worth into the stratosphere.
Sadly, and as usual, the geniuses on the opposition benches in parliament, missed yet another opportunity to nail the rogues into whose hands our nation has fallen - and finally force them to tell all of us, precisely how much our now heavily-indebted nation, is having to make, in regular interest payments, to those prescient overseas investors, who piled into the US$ 750 millions sovereign bonds, this regime issued overseas.
They must now make amends and ask exactly what this regime's sovereign bond regular interest payment plan is: and precisely what all that money was used for. Above all , they must demand to know, if it was used to create wealth that will generate revenues for our country, going forward, into the future: or if it was merely used to fund the extravagant lifestyles of our rulers – such as supporting their wanderlust-addiction habit.
They must do the same thing, too, as regards the GT corporate bonds, issued in London, on that company’s behalf, by Iroko: in that most egregious of examples of insider-dealing ever seen in the history of corporate Ghana.
Whiles they are at it, they must also ask that very honest gentleman, to break down, item by item, the US$72 millions in "other costs" that not too long ago, he proposed to subtract from projected borrowed money (some US$300 plus to repay GT'S "debt", if my memory serves me right!).
Once upon a time, dear reader, they apparently intended to saddle this and future generations of Ghanaians and their country, with yet another loan - in the hope of getting their usual hard currency kickbacks, from their regime-crony oligarchs in our financial services sector (according to some of their critics, i.e.!).
This was before the global credit crunch (in the aftermath of the meltdown in the financial markets of the West), when they felt they were the masters of the universe - and were talking glibly about raising some US$300 plus millions in the capital markets of the West, to repay GT's "debt"!
Curiously (and to the astonishment of the foreign carpetbaggers, apparently!), it is rumoured that this government, was so desperate to seal the deal (no doubt to save their “blushes” – nudge, nudge, wink, wink!), that it took it upon itself, to remove from GT’s wealthy suitor’s massive shoulders, that debt, which Iroko inveigled GT into burdening itself with, when the greedy rogues in this regime, struck that infamous takeover deal.
Yet, as it became obvious to many, shortly after the deal, Iroko issued those bonds on GT's behalf, without the company's managers having any clear idea of a solid revenue stream-providing product, to guarantee that the company would still remain stable financially, even as the regular repayments, which had to be made to those clever overseas investors, who bought the bonds as a good source of regular income, were made. So why did our nation have to assume that debt too? Can it not be argued that Iroko was criminally negligent in its role as the issuing house, to a certain extent? Incredible!
Apparently (according to the bush telegraph, i.e.!), the local professional advisors of the foreign carpetbaggers, who bought that stake in the company, are rumoured to have only got their clients to agree to the deal, after they got the government to agree it would pass a law indemnifying them from any future prosecution - to protect people from their side from any collateral damage: in case regime-change occurred as a result of the December 2008 elections.
Poor fools: Why, were those super-expensive local corporate lawyers they hired and paid zillions to, not decent enough, to tell them, that far from conferring immunity on any unethical actions, that law actually is an illegality - as our constitution enjoins all Ghanaians to fight corruption: not aid and abet foreign carpetbaggers, out to rip-off mother Ghana? Amazing!
They will “smell pepper” one day, for sure - to use our "Hypocrite-in-Chief’s” favourite crude phrase: "deployed" when he is feeling on top of the world and thinks he is invincible because he is Commander-in-Chief of our military and monarch of all he surveys in our homeland Ghana. Poor soul!
What power did his predecessor not have, once upon a time, I ask, dear reader? At a certain point in time, was he not the hero of June 4th 1979, no less? Well, today, what power does that poor, angry old man with an unhealthy beer-paunch, have? Incidentally, forgetting that Napoleon Bonaparte was height-challenged too, our sadly now much-discredited hero of 4th June, 1979 apparently thinks that short people don’t amount to much!
But I digress, dear reader. If even the smallest primary school children in our country today, know that in issuing bonds overseas, one must always have a plan that clearly outlines the sources from whence bond-issuing parties intend making regular payments to investors who buy those bonds one issues, why then are our opposition parliamentarians not asking the right questions about our unacceptably large external debt today?
Exactly when are the geniuses on the opposition benches in parliament going to ask this incompetent regime, precisely what plans they had in place, to enable them meet the regular interest payments on both classes of bonds, so far issued overseas: i.e. the sovereign bonds and the GT corporate bonds (if that too was shifted unto our nation’s shoulders - in that “one-way-street” deal, i.e.!)?
Have the opposition members not heard the bush-telegraph story that some of the clever politicians ruling us today, took a strategic decision to use overseas loans and bond issues as their preferred personal wealth creation vehicle - garnering hard currency kickbacks from the super-fat fees earned by their cronies in Ghana's financial services sector: the politically well-connected "deal-makers"?
Do they not know that it is the process through which they are said to have received kickbacks from the regime-crony oligarchs, those well-connected and powerful Ghanaian financial services sector Titans, who are said to have shared their super-fat fees with them: which is why they have piled up so much debt in such a relatively short time, since they graduated from Chinese hairdressing salons in the seedy backstreets of London, to the piranha-infested waters of the capital markets of the West?
Let the opposition wake up from its slumber - and pose the right questions in parliament, for once. Henceforth, let the VALCO fiasco be their eternal guide - and act to protect the interests of our country, at all times, going forward, into the future. Haba!
Those of us who wrote publicly against the idea of hedging that was mooted by some of our geniuses, as a way to protect our country from the spikes in the price of oil, were aghast that the opposition did not point it out to the well-educated morons who came up with the idea, that that was what ruined the now-defunct Ashanti Goldfields, in the end. They must stop overlooking such lunacies, in future, too.
Hmmm, Ghana - eyeasem oo! Enti yeawiaye paa, enia? Asem eba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
Thursday, 13 November 2008
PERHAPS THE GHANAIAN GOVERNMENT THINKS IT CAN FOOL SOME OF THE PEOPLE OF GHANA, ALL THE TIME – BUT CAN IT EVER FOOL ALL GHANAIANS ALL THE TIME?
Quotation from the Chronicle newspaper (Wednesday, 12 November 2008): “The Trade Minister cautioned that the deal was very sensitive and that newspaper reports could force the consortium to back out from the deal. “My friend, we don’t want to lose this deal, it is a very sensitive matter,” Hon Owusu-Ankomah elaborated. He indicated that officials were briefing a joint committee of parliament, which consisted of both members of the majority and minority on the level of the development of the agreement, which was recently signed."
“He said, elsewhere such deals are shrouded in secrecy until it was sealed, but because the government wanted to be transparent, it sent the agreement to parliament and thereby making it public. He called on Ghanaians not to panic and that everything was under control...” End of quotation.
What perfidy! Is the US government’s current dealing with companies in that great nation’s financial services sector shrouded in secrecy? Is the search for a buyer for Alitalia, even in the land of the boorish “sun-tanned” Mafioso, enveloped in a miasma of mystery? Pure nonsense on bamboo stilts! Just what do these well-educated morons take us for, I ask, dear reader?
When Mr. Owusu-Ankomah says: ”My friend, we don’t want to lose this deal, it is a very sensitive matter...” precisely what does this too-clever-by-half gentleman mean? That, they are still trying to inveigle two ethically-run multinationals (who clearly aren’t interested in buying VALCO, whatever Mssrs. Owusu-Ankomah & Co. might say to the contrary!), into naming their terms, whatever they are: and be rewarded with VALCO, for a song, by a desperate government of Ghana - now anxious not to lose face, perhaps?
Well, there are those who might also say that what he really means is that the regime-crony oligarchs (or as the uncharitable might say, the well-connected crooks: the high net worth ”connection-men/women” who front for the few powerful rogues, who dominate this regime!), whom his colleague, the minister for parliamentary affairs, Mr. Benjamin Osei Aidoo, referred disdainfully to (in the barbed phrase: ”...If it turns out that the other party or the person or agent ... did not have the mandate, that’s a matter between the Ghana government and that other party..."), are now trying a last-ditch attempt, to salvage the deal - and preserve their ever-so lucrative “finder’s-fees” and their 10 per cent kickbacks: and save the government of which they are such prominent members, from any loss of face.
The Chronicle also says, in referring to the genial genius we have as our trade and industry minister: “He said, elsewhere such deals are shrouded in secrecy until it was sealed, but because the government wanted to be transparent, it sent the agreement to parliament and thereby making it public. He called on Ghanaians not to panic and that everything was under control."
Since Mr. Owusu-Ankomah says the government wants to be “transparent” about this shabby deal, can he tell us who are the lucky individual/s that his colleague the minister for parliamentary affairs, Mr. Benjamin Osei Aidoo, refers disdainfully to, when he said: ”...If it turns out that the other party or the person or agent ... did not have the mandate, that’s a matter between the Ghana government and that other party..."?
What exactly was the “mandate” of those blessed and incompetent, regime crony-oligarchs, who brokered this deal? Was it to do their usual thing - to go and look for carpetbaggers overseas, whom they could form a secret joint-venture with, using their usual special purpose vehicles, those opaque offshore companies: through which they launder their sundry privatisation "finders-fees" and usual 10 per cent kickbacks, in a deal cloaked with respectability, which was signed, sealed and delivered, as a "consortium" (and in this case christened “International Aluminum Partners”, no less)?
The trouble about this regime, more so than any other regime we have had in our chequered 51-year history, is that many of its members actually don’t seem to remember that wise Ghanaian saying: ”No condition is permanent.” Has Mr. Owusu-Ankomah forgotten just how powerful the former president was, once upon a time, in our history? What power does he have today? Zilch!
When they start acting as if they think that they are invincible because today they control the security apparatus, let them cast their minds back to the Kalabule-era that presaged the events of the 4th June 1979 military uprising - and recall just how the well-connected regime-crony oligarchs of yesteryear, were also grabbing everything in the land they could lay their grubby hands on. Well, how did that lot end up – and where did the unfathomable greed that drove them, land some of them, finally?
Our politicians must understand that they can fool some of the people all the time (especially those tiresome “My-party-my-tribe-right-or-wrong” myrmidons: who wear blinkers permanently - and are too thick to think, and too blind to see!), but they can never fool all the people of Ghana, all the time.
Hmmm, Ghana – enti yeawiaye paa enia? Asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
“He said, elsewhere such deals are shrouded in secrecy until it was sealed, but because the government wanted to be transparent, it sent the agreement to parliament and thereby making it public. He called on Ghanaians not to panic and that everything was under control...” End of quotation.
What perfidy! Is the US government’s current dealing with companies in that great nation’s financial services sector shrouded in secrecy? Is the search for a buyer for Alitalia, even in the land of the boorish “sun-tanned” Mafioso, enveloped in a miasma of mystery? Pure nonsense on bamboo stilts! Just what do these well-educated morons take us for, I ask, dear reader?
When Mr. Owusu-Ankomah says: ”My friend, we don’t want to lose this deal, it is a very sensitive matter...” precisely what does this too-clever-by-half gentleman mean? That, they are still trying to inveigle two ethically-run multinationals (who clearly aren’t interested in buying VALCO, whatever Mssrs. Owusu-Ankomah & Co. might say to the contrary!), into naming their terms, whatever they are: and be rewarded with VALCO, for a song, by a desperate government of Ghana - now anxious not to lose face, perhaps?
Well, there are those who might also say that what he really means is that the regime-crony oligarchs (or as the uncharitable might say, the well-connected crooks: the high net worth ”connection-men/women” who front for the few powerful rogues, who dominate this regime!), whom his colleague, the minister for parliamentary affairs, Mr. Benjamin Osei Aidoo, referred disdainfully to (in the barbed phrase: ”...If it turns out that the other party or the person or agent ... did not have the mandate, that’s a matter between the Ghana government and that other party..."), are now trying a last-ditch attempt, to salvage the deal - and preserve their ever-so lucrative “finder’s-fees” and their 10 per cent kickbacks: and save the government of which they are such prominent members, from any loss of face.
The Chronicle also says, in referring to the genial genius we have as our trade and industry minister: “He said, elsewhere such deals are shrouded in secrecy until it was sealed, but because the government wanted to be transparent, it sent the agreement to parliament and thereby making it public. He called on Ghanaians not to panic and that everything was under control."
Since Mr. Owusu-Ankomah says the government wants to be “transparent” about this shabby deal, can he tell us who are the lucky individual/s that his colleague the minister for parliamentary affairs, Mr. Benjamin Osei Aidoo, refers disdainfully to, when he said: ”...If it turns out that the other party or the person or agent ... did not have the mandate, that’s a matter between the Ghana government and that other party..."?
What exactly was the “mandate” of those blessed and incompetent, regime crony-oligarchs, who brokered this deal? Was it to do their usual thing - to go and look for carpetbaggers overseas, whom they could form a secret joint-venture with, using their usual special purpose vehicles, those opaque offshore companies: through which they launder their sundry privatisation "finders-fees" and usual 10 per cent kickbacks, in a deal cloaked with respectability, which was signed, sealed and delivered, as a "consortium" (and in this case christened “International Aluminum Partners”, no less)?
The trouble about this regime, more so than any other regime we have had in our chequered 51-year history, is that many of its members actually don’t seem to remember that wise Ghanaian saying: ”No condition is permanent.” Has Mr. Owusu-Ankomah forgotten just how powerful the former president was, once upon a time, in our history? What power does he have today? Zilch!
When they start acting as if they think that they are invincible because today they control the security apparatus, let them cast their minds back to the Kalabule-era that presaged the events of the 4th June 1979 military uprising - and recall just how the well-connected regime-crony oligarchs of yesteryear, were also grabbing everything in the land they could lay their grubby hands on. Well, how did that lot end up – and where did the unfathomable greed that drove them, land some of them, finally?
Our politicians must understand that they can fool some of the people all the time (especially those tiresome “My-party-my-tribe-right-or-wrong” myrmidons: who wear blinkers permanently - and are too thick to think, and too blind to see!), but they can never fool all the people of Ghana, all the time.
Hmmm, Ghana – enti yeawiaye paa enia? Asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
Wednesday, 12 November 2008
WAS THIS THE MOST SHAMEFUL, DISGRACEFUL AND SHABBIEST DEAL EVER DREAMT UP, TO DEFRAUD MOTHER GHANA, IN OUR HISTORY?
Massa, with respect, although the crooks in this regime were successful with Vodafone, it was really just a lucky break for them - and even in that particular deal, they were successful, only after they gave the assuarance that they would pass a law indemnifying those involved in the deal, from being prosecuted in future, for the unethical things that went on in that shabby deal, which was full of insider-dealing of the very worst kind.
The fact of the matter, is that the majority of Western companies are mostly underpined by corporate good governance principles – especially those whose shares are traded on reputable stock exchanges. Consequently, they do not play silly games that could end up damaging their reputation: simply in order to "beat down shares “ and “play a little politics with issues" (as you unfortunately put it!) for that purpose.
Massa, that is precisely because their executives know the eventual results of such unethical corporate governance practices (especially those perpetrated against poor developing nations in Africa): their institutional shareholders and regulators, in their own home countries, will take them to task.
Why do you think that in the aftermath of the takeover by Anglogold of Ashanti Goldfields, the board of that company, meeting in London, turned down a request for payment of half a million pounds sterling, to the important local personage, who was instrumental in Anglogold eventually beating Randgold: and successfully taking over Ashanti Goldfields?
Perhaps you ought to read the words of the minister for parliamentary affairs, Mr. Benjamin Osei Aidoo, who, in asking that parliament should not to be blamed for the ‘fraud’, is reported to have said: “For us, we were mandated to approve of an agreement [between] two parties, one of them being the Ghana government...If it turns out that the other party or the person or agent ... did not have the mandate, that’s a matter between the Ghana government and that other party."
In other words, he was passing the buck, Massa - and thus protecting himself from any future “collateral damage” that might emanate from this deal. Like the deal with Mrs. Cotton, which landed some people from the previous regime in jail, some people in this regime, too, will land in prison, someday, for this outrageous and shabby fraud, against Ghana.
A key factor in the bad luck for the crooks in the ruling regime that pushed this fraudulent deal is that Norske Hydro and VALE both have very proactive home national governments that care about nations like ours, and will not tolerate any rip-off of our country carried out by companies legally domiciled in their jurisdictions.
In any other jurisdiction, heads would be rolling by now as a result of such a major scandal - fraud that actually ended up in a whole national parliament passing a law it should have never passed if they were more vigilant and protective of the national interest. This is a very serious matter - and someday those who pushed this shabby deal will be jailed for it, as sure as day follows night: you mark my words, Massa.
What we should now get the minority side in parliament to do, is to quickly get the relevant parliamentary committee to find out if any asset-stripping has gone on in VALCO - which has a very valuable property portfolio that contains some of the most desirous residential properties in Tema.
We must ensure that the few powerful and greedy crooks who dominate this regime, and whose greed apparently knows no bounds, have not succeeded (and do not succeed!) in getting VALCO to sell them some of its properties: especially for values far below prevailing market rates. God - what a country: do these greedy people know no shame at all? Incredible!
Hmmm, Ghana - enti yeawiaye paa, enia? Asem ebaba debi ankasa! Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
The fact of the matter, is that the majority of Western companies are mostly underpined by corporate good governance principles – especially those whose shares are traded on reputable stock exchanges. Consequently, they do not play silly games that could end up damaging their reputation: simply in order to "beat down shares “ and “play a little politics with issues" (as you unfortunately put it!) for that purpose.
Massa, that is precisely because their executives know the eventual results of such unethical corporate governance practices (especially those perpetrated against poor developing nations in Africa): their institutional shareholders and regulators, in their own home countries, will take them to task.
Why do you think that in the aftermath of the takeover by Anglogold of Ashanti Goldfields, the board of that company, meeting in London, turned down a request for payment of half a million pounds sterling, to the important local personage, who was instrumental in Anglogold eventually beating Randgold: and successfully taking over Ashanti Goldfields?
Perhaps you ought to read the words of the minister for parliamentary affairs, Mr. Benjamin Osei Aidoo, who, in asking that parliament should not to be blamed for the ‘fraud’, is reported to have said: “For us, we were mandated to approve of an agreement [between] two parties, one of them being the Ghana government...If it turns out that the other party or the person or agent ... did not have the mandate, that’s a matter between the Ghana government and that other party."
In other words, he was passing the buck, Massa - and thus protecting himself from any future “collateral damage” that might emanate from this deal. Like the deal with Mrs. Cotton, which landed some people from the previous regime in jail, some people in this regime, too, will land in prison, someday, for this outrageous and shabby fraud, against Ghana.
A key factor in the bad luck for the crooks in the ruling regime that pushed this fraudulent deal is that Norske Hydro and VALE both have very proactive home national governments that care about nations like ours, and will not tolerate any rip-off of our country carried out by companies legally domiciled in their jurisdictions.
In any other jurisdiction, heads would be rolling by now as a result of such a major scandal - fraud that actually ended up in a whole national parliament passing a law it should have never passed if they were more vigilant and protective of the national interest. This is a very serious matter - and someday those who pushed this shabby deal will be jailed for it, as sure as day follows night: you mark my words, Massa.
What we should now get the minority side in parliament to do, is to quickly get the relevant parliamentary committee to find out if any asset-stripping has gone on in VALCO - which has a very valuable property portfolio that contains some of the most desirous residential properties in Tema.
We must ensure that the few powerful and greedy crooks who dominate this regime, and whose greed apparently knows no bounds, have not succeeded (and do not succeed!) in getting VALCO to sell them some of its properties: especially for values far below prevailing market rates. God - what a country: do these greedy people know no shame at all? Incredible!
Hmmm, Ghana - enti yeawiaye paa, enia? Asem ebaba debi ankasa! Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
President Joseph Kabila: The Desperation Of Your Civilian Population In Eastern DR Congo Demands Extrenme Measures Now!
Greetings Your Excellency,
The desperate situation of the citizens of the eastern part of your beautiful but troubled country, demands extreme measures by your government. Let me begin by reminding you that over five million of our fellow Africans have died from war, starvation and disease in Eastern DR Congo, since 1996.
Sir, your regime must take extreme measures if you are to end the carnage in that part of your country, where the warlord and war criminal, Laurent Nkunda, operates. Forget about the nations of the West - by definition, they do not care: because in the final analysis they are not prepared to risk the lives of their troops to save the citizens of eastern DR Congo (who are “mere Africans” in their eyes, after all).
You must move quickly to get the Chinese to come to your aid, Sir: just as they came to the aid of Zambia and built the Tanzara railway when that nation needed to find a sea outlet to the north, and the Western nations wouldn’t help them do so - because their real sympathies lay with the apartheid regimes of South Africa and Rhodesia.
Strike an agreement with the Chinese, as soon as it is practical to do so: stationing some of their Special Forces in your country, to safeguard your country’s territorial integrity, train and equip your military, and help protect the eastern border - in exchange for exclusive access to the whole of DR Congo’s mineral wealth.
Tear up all the agreements your government has signed with private corporations thus far: they have all done business with Nkunda and other rebels in the past, have they not? None of them will ever lift a finger to help your country in its hour of need. Above all, how many battalions of Special Forces do they command that can save your regime, Sir? Zilch.
Sir, your country’s very existence is at stake - you heard what Captain Seco, Nkunda's junior brother, recently said about unacceptable “colonial” arrangements of the past, did you not? What he really meant, was that they actually seek the unraveling of DR Congo as a sovereign nation-state - so that they can secede and set up their own Tutsi apartheid state eventually, just as their fellow Tutsi allies in Rwanda have succeeded in doing: whiles the whole world turns a blind eye to their tyranny, because virtually all the nations in it, have become enfeebled by political correctness.
As for the fallout from tearing up all previous mining agreements with private corporations from around the globe, your regime need not worry your heads about any fallout, from such a move. You have got the concept and notion of force majeure and the sympathy of global public opinion on your side, should you take such a step against those callous and greedy corporations and businesspeople from the West, and sundry carpetbaggers from elsewhere.
Your Excellency, please demand that the UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon gets rid of all the present UN troops - and replaces them with an all-Chinese UN peacekeeping force. In addition, approach China directly to send Chinese Special Forces to your country, as part of a bilateral defence treaty - which you must endeavour to sign immediately with them, Sir.
If you rely on the UN for additional troops, you can depend on it that there will be endless wrangling about “details” rather than quickly sending additional troops - whiles your nation and its people, slowly bleed to death in an emergency. Never forget that no Western nation wants or intends to send troops to DR Congo, an Africa nation: if there is even the slightest possibility that any of them will die in battle.
Sir, simply reach an agreement with China as soon as it is practicable to do so and sign a defence agreement with them. A force of 200,000 Chinese Special Forces will guarantee the territorial integrity of your country, like nothing else will. Do not rely on the promises of your fellow African leaders, either: they do not have the means to keep their promises to you - and in any case their troops will probably only end up becoming involved in the pillage of the mineral wealth of eastern DR Congo.
Your colleague Paul Kagame will soon get his comeuppance - they are like tin gods in their country Rwanda: and think they can strut around the rest of the world like tin gods too. The arrest of Rose Kabuye, who was no doubt on a mission to secure some of the zillions of dollars they have made from looting your country’s wealth and stashed away in various banks in Europe, means their past is now catching up with them - and she, one of Africa's powerful "glorious-untouchables", will now get her day in court soon.
Eventually, they will all pay for gang-raping your country so brutally, through the agency of that quisling and war criminal, who is committing high treason by fighting the elected government of his own country - the murderous traitor and war criminal, Laurent Nkunda.
Sir, move quickly to convince the Chinese to make your country their special partner in Africa (like the "special relationship" between the UK and the US). Let them have all the minerals they want at prevailing market prices and in transparent joint-ventures with the DR Congo nation-state - but only on the understanding that when peace is finally secured and your infrastructure is renewed, value will be added locally to all DR Congo's minerals, to enable you create sustainable growth: and real jobs for your people. That way, some day, your great nation might even become the world's biggest producer of mobile phones. Imagine that, Sir!
Let them train your armed forces too, as part of your defence treaty with them. Forget about the West - they are not reliable allies to depend on to save your country’s territorial integrity, ever. Can you imagine that boorish Silvio Berlusconi coming to your country’s aid - a country full of super "sun-tanned" human beings?
Go for a close and special relationship with China: which will gladly help you rebuild and renew your country's infrastructure in batter agreements – and do so now, Sir! Peace and blessings to you and your long-suffering people.
Yours sincerely,
Kofi Thompson.
PS Talk to President Bush to get Erik Prince's Blackwater Corporation to quickly train five special battalions of DR Congo Special Forces: whose main task will be to find and either arrest or kill, that monster Laurent Nkunda.
Let it be a "trainer of trainers" deal - so that they will eventually train their own colleagues, too! Do batters with Erik Prince too - so that his company acts as advisors to your general staff and battalion commanders: in exchange for gold.
Get the Bush regime to ask the Pentagon to provide your special forces with the new weapon the US has developed that uses the heat from laser guns to disable opposing troops. Ditto armed remote-controlled drones and drones with cameras. Use jet bombers to precision-bomb that Tutsi bastard Nkunda too, Sir. Quickly get air-power help, especially helicopter gunships, from the Chinese too.
The desperate situation of the citizens of the eastern part of your beautiful but troubled country, demands extreme measures by your government. Let me begin by reminding you that over five million of our fellow Africans have died from war, starvation and disease in Eastern DR Congo, since 1996.
Sir, your regime must take extreme measures if you are to end the carnage in that part of your country, where the warlord and war criminal, Laurent Nkunda, operates. Forget about the nations of the West - by definition, they do not care: because in the final analysis they are not prepared to risk the lives of their troops to save the citizens of eastern DR Congo (who are “mere Africans” in their eyes, after all).
You must move quickly to get the Chinese to come to your aid, Sir: just as they came to the aid of Zambia and built the Tanzara railway when that nation needed to find a sea outlet to the north, and the Western nations wouldn’t help them do so - because their real sympathies lay with the apartheid regimes of South Africa and Rhodesia.
Strike an agreement with the Chinese, as soon as it is practical to do so: stationing some of their Special Forces in your country, to safeguard your country’s territorial integrity, train and equip your military, and help protect the eastern border - in exchange for exclusive access to the whole of DR Congo’s mineral wealth.
Tear up all the agreements your government has signed with private corporations thus far: they have all done business with Nkunda and other rebels in the past, have they not? None of them will ever lift a finger to help your country in its hour of need. Above all, how many battalions of Special Forces do they command that can save your regime, Sir? Zilch.
Sir, your country’s very existence is at stake - you heard what Captain Seco, Nkunda's junior brother, recently said about unacceptable “colonial” arrangements of the past, did you not? What he really meant, was that they actually seek the unraveling of DR Congo as a sovereign nation-state - so that they can secede and set up their own Tutsi apartheid state eventually, just as their fellow Tutsi allies in Rwanda have succeeded in doing: whiles the whole world turns a blind eye to their tyranny, because virtually all the nations in it, have become enfeebled by political correctness.
As for the fallout from tearing up all previous mining agreements with private corporations from around the globe, your regime need not worry your heads about any fallout, from such a move. You have got the concept and notion of force majeure and the sympathy of global public opinion on your side, should you take such a step against those callous and greedy corporations and businesspeople from the West, and sundry carpetbaggers from elsewhere.
Your Excellency, please demand that the UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon gets rid of all the present UN troops - and replaces them with an all-Chinese UN peacekeeping force. In addition, approach China directly to send Chinese Special Forces to your country, as part of a bilateral defence treaty - which you must endeavour to sign immediately with them, Sir.
If you rely on the UN for additional troops, you can depend on it that there will be endless wrangling about “details” rather than quickly sending additional troops - whiles your nation and its people, slowly bleed to death in an emergency. Never forget that no Western nation wants or intends to send troops to DR Congo, an Africa nation: if there is even the slightest possibility that any of them will die in battle.
Sir, simply reach an agreement with China as soon as it is practicable to do so and sign a defence agreement with them. A force of 200,000 Chinese Special Forces will guarantee the territorial integrity of your country, like nothing else will. Do not rely on the promises of your fellow African leaders, either: they do not have the means to keep their promises to you - and in any case their troops will probably only end up becoming involved in the pillage of the mineral wealth of eastern DR Congo.
Your colleague Paul Kagame will soon get his comeuppance - they are like tin gods in their country Rwanda: and think they can strut around the rest of the world like tin gods too. The arrest of Rose Kabuye, who was no doubt on a mission to secure some of the zillions of dollars they have made from looting your country’s wealth and stashed away in various banks in Europe, means their past is now catching up with them - and she, one of Africa's powerful "glorious-untouchables", will now get her day in court soon.
Eventually, they will all pay for gang-raping your country so brutally, through the agency of that quisling and war criminal, who is committing high treason by fighting the elected government of his own country - the murderous traitor and war criminal, Laurent Nkunda.
Sir, move quickly to convince the Chinese to make your country their special partner in Africa (like the "special relationship" between the UK and the US). Let them have all the minerals they want at prevailing market prices and in transparent joint-ventures with the DR Congo nation-state - but only on the understanding that when peace is finally secured and your infrastructure is renewed, value will be added locally to all DR Congo's minerals, to enable you create sustainable growth: and real jobs for your people. That way, some day, your great nation might even become the world's biggest producer of mobile phones. Imagine that, Sir!
Let them train your armed forces too, as part of your defence treaty with them. Forget about the West - they are not reliable allies to depend on to save your country’s territorial integrity, ever. Can you imagine that boorish Silvio Berlusconi coming to your country’s aid - a country full of super "sun-tanned" human beings?
Go for a close and special relationship with China: which will gladly help you rebuild and renew your country's infrastructure in batter agreements – and do so now, Sir! Peace and blessings to you and your long-suffering people.
Yours sincerely,
Kofi Thompson.
PS Talk to President Bush to get Erik Prince's Blackwater Corporation to quickly train five special battalions of DR Congo Special Forces: whose main task will be to find and either arrest or kill, that monster Laurent Nkunda.
Let it be a "trainer of trainers" deal - so that they will eventually train their own colleagues, too! Do batters with Erik Prince too - so that his company acts as advisors to your general staff and battalion commanders: in exchange for gold.
Get the Bush regime to ask the Pentagon to provide your special forces with the new weapon the US has developed that uses the heat from laser guns to disable opposing troops. Ditto armed remote-controlled drones and drones with cameras. Use jet bombers to precision-bomb that Tutsi bastard Nkunda too, Sir. Quickly get air-power help, especially helicopter gunships, from the Chinese too.
Tuesday, 11 November 2008
STOP THE WARLORD AND WAR CRIMINAL LAURENT NKUNDA NOW!
The suffering being caused to hundreds of thousands of ordinary Congolese by the cruel and callous actions of the Tutsi warlord Laurent Nkunda in North Kivu, DR Congo, are totally unacceptable.
He must be indicted by the International Criminal Court (ICC), as soon as it is practicable to do so. What is going on the eastern part of the DR Congo is outrageous - and an affront to the whole of Africa: and the rest of the world.
How can it be, that in the 21st century, nearly a million Africans, living in a constitutional democracy, with an elected government, are at the mercy of a ruthless and ambitious war criminal, being backed on the quiet by neighbouring Rwanda - and yet no one seems brave enough to speak out against Rwanda’s crafty and arrogant ruling Tutsi elite?
The renegade Nkunda, whose current display of his usual recourse to opportunism, is to hijack and deploy the latest fashionable African political phrase: "power-sharing" in a brazen attempt to give respectability to his unpardonable and unspeakable acts of cruelty, which really amount to crimes against humanity.
How is it that one man, with such overweening ambition, and driven by unfathomable greed (for gold and coltan - used to make mobile phones) is allowed by the world to destroy the lives of his fellow Congolese citizens so callously, in pursuit of his (and Rwanda’s ruling business and political elites’) ambition: to control the vast mineral wealth of eastern DR Congo – and get away with it for so long?
To help DR Congo’s poor citizens, the EU and the UN ought to consider imposing economic (and arms) sanctions on Rwanda, if it doesn't stop aiding Nkunda. On its part, the DR Congo government must now appeal to the US Africa Command to help it quickly build a refugee camp - and help it airlift the 800,000 Rwandan Hutu refugees in North Kivu, to Western DR Congo to that new camp, as soon as that is practicable.
Nkunda's real objective is to secede from DR Congo and set up a Tutsi-dominated apartheid state, similar to the apartheid state that is Rwanda today: a nation in which the Tutsi minority dominates society totally.
In a world enfeebled by political correctness, truth dare not speak its name loudly: and confirm the fact that Rwanda is an unjust society and a police state masquerading as a democracy - and desirous of creating a greater Tutsi nation, by using Tutsi proxies outside its borders.
Rwanda’s Tutsi ruling elites must not be allowed to succeed in their aim of a Greater Tutsi nation - especially when they are pillaging DR Congo's mineral wealth in eastern DR Congo, with such impunity: which is what Nkunda's rebellion is really all about.
It is the threat to the Rwandan (and Congolese) Tutsi business elite’s continued enjoyment of a monopoly of access to the gold and coltan mines in the area, posed by a recent agreement signed by the Kinshasa government, which gives the Chinese access to the mines of Eastern DR Congo that is the real cause of the current fighting embarked upon by Nkunda.
For the sake of the suffering citizens of DR Congo’s North Kivu province, and that of their much-troubled nation, DR Congo, the time has now come for the world to stop the large-scale suffering being caused by the warlord and war criminal Laurent Nkunda - and it must be done now!
He must be indicted by the International Criminal Court (ICC), as soon as it is practicable to do so. What is going on the eastern part of the DR Congo is outrageous - and an affront to the whole of Africa: and the rest of the world.
How can it be, that in the 21st century, nearly a million Africans, living in a constitutional democracy, with an elected government, are at the mercy of a ruthless and ambitious war criminal, being backed on the quiet by neighbouring Rwanda - and yet no one seems brave enough to speak out against Rwanda’s crafty and arrogant ruling Tutsi elite?
The renegade Nkunda, whose current display of his usual recourse to opportunism, is to hijack and deploy the latest fashionable African political phrase: "power-sharing" in a brazen attempt to give respectability to his unpardonable and unspeakable acts of cruelty, which really amount to crimes against humanity.
How is it that one man, with such overweening ambition, and driven by unfathomable greed (for gold and coltan - used to make mobile phones) is allowed by the world to destroy the lives of his fellow Congolese citizens so callously, in pursuit of his (and Rwanda’s ruling business and political elites’) ambition: to control the vast mineral wealth of eastern DR Congo – and get away with it for so long?
To help DR Congo’s poor citizens, the EU and the UN ought to consider imposing economic (and arms) sanctions on Rwanda, if it doesn't stop aiding Nkunda. On its part, the DR Congo government must now appeal to the US Africa Command to help it quickly build a refugee camp - and help it airlift the 800,000 Rwandan Hutu refugees in North Kivu, to Western DR Congo to that new camp, as soon as that is practicable.
Nkunda's real objective is to secede from DR Congo and set up a Tutsi-dominated apartheid state, similar to the apartheid state that is Rwanda today: a nation in which the Tutsi minority dominates society totally.
In a world enfeebled by political correctness, truth dare not speak its name loudly: and confirm the fact that Rwanda is an unjust society and a police state masquerading as a democracy - and desirous of creating a greater Tutsi nation, by using Tutsi proxies outside its borders.
Rwanda’s Tutsi ruling elites must not be allowed to succeed in their aim of a Greater Tutsi nation - especially when they are pillaging DR Congo's mineral wealth in eastern DR Congo, with such impunity: which is what Nkunda's rebellion is really all about.
It is the threat to the Rwandan (and Congolese) Tutsi business elite’s continued enjoyment of a monopoly of access to the gold and coltan mines in the area, posed by a recent agreement signed by the Kinshasa government, which gives the Chinese access to the mines of Eastern DR Congo that is the real cause of the current fighting embarked upon by Nkunda.
For the sake of the suffering citizens of DR Congo’s North Kivu province, and that of their much-troubled nation, DR Congo, the time has now come for the world to stop the large-scale suffering being caused by the warlord and war criminal Laurent Nkunda - and it must be done now!
Re: “Our "Rubber Stamp" Parliament Exposed!”
Quote: “If it turns out that the other party or the person or agent ... did not have the mandate, that’s a matter between the Ghana government and that other party..."
“We have done what we were supposed to do under the constitution,” unquote.
Can this genius of a minister for parliamentary affairs, Mr. Benjamin Osei Aidoo, tell the good people of Ghana, precisely who the "other party or the person or agent" he says "did not have a mandate" is, or are?
When he says: “We have done what we were supposed to do under the constitution,” does he think the job of parliament is to assist crooks in the executive branch of government, to successfully sew up deals, which are inimical to our country's interests? (www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/NewsArchive/artikel.php?ID=152881&comment=0#com.)
Could the "other party or the person or agent" that Mr. Benjamin Osei Aidoo mentions (and appears to be so disdainful of!), be one of the many powerful and well-connected Ghanaian regime-crony oligarchs, who are in hock with foreigners - and act as fronts (reaping sundry "finder's fees" - which they share: in addition to the 10 per cent kickbacks they usually get!) for the crooks amongst our political class, who now dominate the ruling party, so completely, in such deals?
Is it the case that "the other party or the person or agent” Mr. Benjamin Osei Aidoo mentions, happens to be the business partners (or agents!) of the crooks amongst our leaders: in those opaque offshore companies that some Ghanaian politicians are said to have set up, in order to launder their kickbacks, through, with such impunity?
The mistake the crooks in this regime made, in this particularly egregious example of the rip off of our country, in a privatisation transaction, by our rulers, is that they forgot that they were dealing with a Scandinavian company that treasures its good name and reputation for corporate good governance.
Norske Hydro was, in all probability, simply not interested in allowing itself to be "shanghaied" into a deal: that was not transparent enough, by their high standards - and would certainly not have countenanced allowing the crooks in government to railroad a bill through parliament, which would have provided them with a law that indemnified their executives: for crooked and underhand actions in a poor developing nation privatisation deal, involving crooked local politicians, and local businesspeople.
In any other nation in the world, this would be a huge scandal - and be investigated thoroughly by the media. Yet, in Ghana, it appears that no one seems to see just how outrageous, embarrassing, and injurious to our country's image, which all this is.
How can it possibly be, that a whole bill could be railroaded through parliament, when no such actual sale and purchase agreement, with the companies that were mentioned, and which formed the basis of the bill, actually existed?
Why, was the transaction rushed through parliament, because the crooks in government, whom this was ultimately meant to benefit, were frightened that the reluctant foreigners were developing a conscience, and would back out of the deal, if there was any further delay?
Why have the Ghanaian media and the opposition parties failed to act to find out if the property portfolio of VALCO is still intact? Has it not occurred to either of them that it is important to find out whether or not asset-stripping has taken place at VALCO, at all?
Is it not important that we find, as soon as it is practicable to do so, for example, whether or not any part of that company’s considerable property portfolio has not ended up in that of some of our ruling elite - or their regime-crony oligarch fronts?
Exactly what kind of a country are our political elite building - and just what kind of an example are they setting for the younger generation of Ghanaians? Have the Benjamin Osei Aidoos of this world, got no sense of shame at all? What perfidy!
Hmmm, Ghana - enti yeawiye paa, enia? Asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
“We have done what we were supposed to do under the constitution,” unquote.
Can this genius of a minister for parliamentary affairs, Mr. Benjamin Osei Aidoo, tell the good people of Ghana, precisely who the "other party or the person or agent" he says "did not have a mandate" is, or are?
When he says: “We have done what we were supposed to do under the constitution,” does he think the job of parliament is to assist crooks in the executive branch of government, to successfully sew up deals, which are inimical to our country's interests? (www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/NewsArchive/artikel.php?ID=152881&comment=0#com.)
Could the "other party or the person or agent" that Mr. Benjamin Osei Aidoo mentions (and appears to be so disdainful of!), be one of the many powerful and well-connected Ghanaian regime-crony oligarchs, who are in hock with foreigners - and act as fronts (reaping sundry "finder's fees" - which they share: in addition to the 10 per cent kickbacks they usually get!) for the crooks amongst our political class, who now dominate the ruling party, so completely, in such deals?
Is it the case that "the other party or the person or agent” Mr. Benjamin Osei Aidoo mentions, happens to be the business partners (or agents!) of the crooks amongst our leaders: in those opaque offshore companies that some Ghanaian politicians are said to have set up, in order to launder their kickbacks, through, with such impunity?
The mistake the crooks in this regime made, in this particularly egregious example of the rip off of our country, in a privatisation transaction, by our rulers, is that they forgot that they were dealing with a Scandinavian company that treasures its good name and reputation for corporate good governance.
Norske Hydro was, in all probability, simply not interested in allowing itself to be "shanghaied" into a deal: that was not transparent enough, by their high standards - and would certainly not have countenanced allowing the crooks in government to railroad a bill through parliament, which would have provided them with a law that indemnified their executives: for crooked and underhand actions in a poor developing nation privatisation deal, involving crooked local politicians, and local businesspeople.
In any other nation in the world, this would be a huge scandal - and be investigated thoroughly by the media. Yet, in Ghana, it appears that no one seems to see just how outrageous, embarrassing, and injurious to our country's image, which all this is.
How can it possibly be, that a whole bill could be railroaded through parliament, when no such actual sale and purchase agreement, with the companies that were mentioned, and which formed the basis of the bill, actually existed?
Why, was the transaction rushed through parliament, because the crooks in government, whom this was ultimately meant to benefit, were frightened that the reluctant foreigners were developing a conscience, and would back out of the deal, if there was any further delay?
Why have the Ghanaian media and the opposition parties failed to act to find out if the property portfolio of VALCO is still intact? Has it not occurred to either of them that it is important to find out whether or not asset-stripping has taken place at VALCO, at all?
Is it not important that we find, as soon as it is practicable to do so, for example, whether or not any part of that company’s considerable property portfolio has not ended up in that of some of our ruling elite - or their regime-crony oligarch fronts?
Exactly what kind of a country are our political elite building - and just what kind of an example are they setting for the younger generation of Ghanaians? Have the Benjamin Osei Aidoos of this world, got no sense of shame at all? What perfidy!
Hmmm, Ghana - enti yeawiye paa, enia? Asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
Saturday, 8 November 2008
AN EMAIL TO A FELLOW JOURNALIST: ON SENATOR OBAMA’S ELECTION AS THE NEXT US PRESIDENT!
Thank you for your kind words. Well, as more and more of humanity start becoming aware of the fragility of the planet Earth, the more they will opt to actively play their own small part in helping to save our planet.
That vote for Obama is part of that coming New Age - and was a vote by a majority of Americans for common decency: and for their nation to start putting the debilitating racial divisions of the past, behind it.
Those who chose Obama were showing their determination to look beyond race in dealing with their fellow human beings. That was the underlying factor when they cast their votes, in choosing which of the two candidates they felt was a better leader, intellectually, and temperamentally, for their great country.
Mark my words, if those who choose to still live in the past don't eliminate him first (God forbid!), he will go down in history as one of the greatest presidents of America.
The election of Senator Obama is a harbinger of the new world that awaits us - which will come into being once we find a way to finally save our planet. Humankind will then decide that we really are one human race after all, indeed: and must unite to preserve the earth. It’s a long way away, yet - but it will come as sure as day follows night.
As for the Messrs. Silvio "Forever-putting-their-foot-in-it" Berlusconis of this world, with their 'exquisite' ("old world") manners and their very honest business methods (alas!), they represent a dying age: just as the massive budget deficits and the rubbish that is engulfing some of the 'marvelous' and 'charming' Italian prime minister's nation's major cities, represents a declining nation (from the point of a view of an African with abundant self-belief, i.e.!).
Best wishes,
Kofi.
That vote for Obama is part of that coming New Age - and was a vote by a majority of Americans for common decency: and for their nation to start putting the debilitating racial divisions of the past, behind it.
Those who chose Obama were showing their determination to look beyond race in dealing with their fellow human beings. That was the underlying factor when they cast their votes, in choosing which of the two candidates they felt was a better leader, intellectually, and temperamentally, for their great country.
Mark my words, if those who choose to still live in the past don't eliminate him first (God forbid!), he will go down in history as one of the greatest presidents of America.
The election of Senator Obama is a harbinger of the new world that awaits us - which will come into being once we find a way to finally save our planet. Humankind will then decide that we really are one human race after all, indeed: and must unite to preserve the earth. It’s a long way away, yet - but it will come as sure as day follows night.
As for the Messrs. Silvio "Forever-putting-their-foot-in-it" Berlusconis of this world, with their 'exquisite' ("old world") manners and their very honest business methods (alas!), they represent a dying age: just as the massive budget deficits and the rubbish that is engulfing some of the 'marvelous' and 'charming' Italian prime minister's nation's major cities, represents a declining nation (from the point of a view of an African with abundant self-belief, i.e.!).
Best wishes,
Kofi.
NPP: Stop Being More Catholic Than The Pope!
Quote: "In an interview with Joy News, however, Deputy Majority Leader, Mr. Osei Kyei Mensah-Bonsu, who oversees business in the House, explained that Parliament needed more time to pass crucial legislation.
He mentioned the Financial Services Bill, the Alternative Dispute Resolution Bill, Integrated Aluminum Industry Bill and several others.
Mr. Mensah-Bonsu indicated that Parliament after the resumption of the last session had had 14th of November as the date for recess.
He said although there had been considerations of an earlier closure of Parliament, several other developments including the funerals of the late Speaker of Parliament, Peter Ala Adjetey, made a case for an extension." End of quote.
Hmmm, Ghana - eyeasem oo: asem ebaba debi ankasa! Well, let the deputy majority leader in parliament, Mr. Osei Kyei Mensah-Bonsu, remember one thing: by constantly railroading bills through parliament that benefit the crooks in the executive branch of government, but are inimical to the nation's interests, they are undermining an important democratic institution, parliament.
What they are doing, in effect amounts to driving the final nails into the coffin of Ghanaian democracy. Parliament, which is the branch of government that has suffered the most from past military interventions in the governance of our country, needs to be respected by Ghanaians, if we want democracy to thrive in Ghana.
A parliament that is seen by ordinary citizens as a rubber-stamp that exists merely for the convenience of the ruling political party, which makes up the executive branch of government, is ultimately doomed to fail in its task of protecting the rights of ordinary people and helping to sustain Ghanaian democracy.
For, if ordinary people feel that parliament is subservient to the executive branch of government, which it is meant to have oversight responsibilities, on the people's behalf, over, in our system of constitutional democracy's checks and balances, it immediately loses its credibility, authority, and prestige - which is disastrous for any legislature, in any democracy, in this world.
The idea of the integrated aluminum industry is a lunatic one, at a time of global climate change - when we ought to hang on to as much of our nation's biodiversity as we possibly can: as it is an important contributory factor in enhancing our quality of life, in the landmass that makes up the territory of the Ghanaian nation-state.
It is sheer madness to tear down the Atiwa Mountain range upland evergreen rainforest, one of only two in our country, and which like all rain forests on the planet Earth, contains untold wealth in yet-to-be-discovered medicinal plants, worth bullions of dollars.
Those who have arranged to get parliament to rush to pass the Integrated Aluminum Industry Bill, will pay for their crimes against humanity one day for sure - as sure as day follows night.
They must not be surprised if one fine day, those who set about to bring to an end, the corrupt 4th Republic, in order to usher in a genuinely democratic 5th Republic (in which there will be clear separation of powers - and no member of the executive will sit in the legislature, thank goodness!), give them the 21st century equivalent of the June 4th 1979 "treatment."
He should also cast his mind back to the Kalabule era, prelude to the events of the June 4th military uprising, when the amoral and the greedy, controlled our nation: and acted with complete impunity - as the few powerful tribal supremacists who dominate his party so completely, now also carry on.
Where are all those once-powerful individuals from yesteryear - who sadly forgot that very wise Ghanaian saying: "No condition is permanent" at the apogee of their power, in the decadent period that presaged the events of 4th June, 1979?
When they are busy manipulating our democratic institutions because they too feel that they are invincible because they control our security apparatus, let them remember that others have walked this disastrous path too before - and suffered the consequences of their delusions of grandeur. A word to the wise...
It might interest the clueless regime of which he is such a prominent member that only just recently, a mushroom was discovered in the rain forests of South America, which, incredibly, produces most of the elements of diesel - and is said to be potentially worth billions of dollars: and could, in the future, perhaps herald a new green bio-industry for the region.
(Independent-minded and non-partisan readers who love mother Ghana, can see an example of what treasures rain forests the world over contain, in yet-to-discovered medicinal plants and other valuable plants from this link: http://www.bio-medicine.org/biology-news-1/New-type-of-fuel-found-in-Patagonia-fungus-5717-1/)
Why deny this and future generations of Ghanaians the benefits of such treasures and the sustainable wealth-creation and green economy opportunities they bring in their wake - just to allow a few greedy crooks in government and the secret foreign partners in their opaque offshore joint-ventures, enrich themselves, for short-term gain - at the long-term expense of our nation and its people?
Why, are the governments of their neo-liberal lords and masters in places like Washington and elsewhere (for whose businesses they are seeking this economic equivalent of an abomination!), not working hard, day and night, to provide their nations' taxpayers' money to help revive moribund, once-powerful private business entities, in order to save their nations’ economies, as we speak?
So, why are they trying so desperately hard to be more Catholic than the Popes of global capitalism – who have all suddenly discovered the wisdom that state intervention secures national economies like nothing else, including “free markets”, does?
Hmmm, Ghana - enti yeawiaye paa enia? Hmmm, eyeasem oo: asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
He mentioned the Financial Services Bill, the Alternative Dispute Resolution Bill, Integrated Aluminum Industry Bill and several others.
Mr. Mensah-Bonsu indicated that Parliament after the resumption of the last session had had 14th of November as the date for recess.
He said although there had been considerations of an earlier closure of Parliament, several other developments including the funerals of the late Speaker of Parliament, Peter Ala Adjetey, made a case for an extension." End of quote.
Hmmm, Ghana - eyeasem oo: asem ebaba debi ankasa! Well, let the deputy majority leader in parliament, Mr. Osei Kyei Mensah-Bonsu, remember one thing: by constantly railroading bills through parliament that benefit the crooks in the executive branch of government, but are inimical to the nation's interests, they are undermining an important democratic institution, parliament.
What they are doing, in effect amounts to driving the final nails into the coffin of Ghanaian democracy. Parliament, which is the branch of government that has suffered the most from past military interventions in the governance of our country, needs to be respected by Ghanaians, if we want democracy to thrive in Ghana.
A parliament that is seen by ordinary citizens as a rubber-stamp that exists merely for the convenience of the ruling political party, which makes up the executive branch of government, is ultimately doomed to fail in its task of protecting the rights of ordinary people and helping to sustain Ghanaian democracy.
For, if ordinary people feel that parliament is subservient to the executive branch of government, which it is meant to have oversight responsibilities, on the people's behalf, over, in our system of constitutional democracy's checks and balances, it immediately loses its credibility, authority, and prestige - which is disastrous for any legislature, in any democracy, in this world.
The idea of the integrated aluminum industry is a lunatic one, at a time of global climate change - when we ought to hang on to as much of our nation's biodiversity as we possibly can: as it is an important contributory factor in enhancing our quality of life, in the landmass that makes up the territory of the Ghanaian nation-state.
It is sheer madness to tear down the Atiwa Mountain range upland evergreen rainforest, one of only two in our country, and which like all rain forests on the planet Earth, contains untold wealth in yet-to-be-discovered medicinal plants, worth bullions of dollars.
Those who have arranged to get parliament to rush to pass the Integrated Aluminum Industry Bill, will pay for their crimes against humanity one day for sure - as sure as day follows night.
They must not be surprised if one fine day, those who set about to bring to an end, the corrupt 4th Republic, in order to usher in a genuinely democratic 5th Republic (in which there will be clear separation of powers - and no member of the executive will sit in the legislature, thank goodness!), give them the 21st century equivalent of the June 4th 1979 "treatment."
He should also cast his mind back to the Kalabule era, prelude to the events of the June 4th military uprising, when the amoral and the greedy, controlled our nation: and acted with complete impunity - as the few powerful tribal supremacists who dominate his party so completely, now also carry on.
Where are all those once-powerful individuals from yesteryear - who sadly forgot that very wise Ghanaian saying: "No condition is permanent" at the apogee of their power, in the decadent period that presaged the events of 4th June, 1979?
When they are busy manipulating our democratic institutions because they too feel that they are invincible because they control our security apparatus, let them remember that others have walked this disastrous path too before - and suffered the consequences of their delusions of grandeur. A word to the wise...
It might interest the clueless regime of which he is such a prominent member that only just recently, a mushroom was discovered in the rain forests of South America, which, incredibly, produces most of the elements of diesel - and is said to be potentially worth billions of dollars: and could, in the future, perhaps herald a new green bio-industry for the region.
(Independent-minded and non-partisan readers who love mother Ghana, can see an example of what treasures rain forests the world over contain, in yet-to-discovered medicinal plants and other valuable plants from this link: http://www.bio-medicine.org/biology-news-1/New-type-of-fuel-found-in-Patagonia-fungus-5717-1/)
Why deny this and future generations of Ghanaians the benefits of such treasures and the sustainable wealth-creation and green economy opportunities they bring in their wake - just to allow a few greedy crooks in government and the secret foreign partners in their opaque offshore joint-ventures, enrich themselves, for short-term gain - at the long-term expense of our nation and its people?
Why, are the governments of their neo-liberal lords and masters in places like Washington and elsewhere (for whose businesses they are seeking this economic equivalent of an abomination!), not working hard, day and night, to provide their nations' taxpayers' money to help revive moribund, once-powerful private business entities, in order to save their nations’ economies, as we speak?
So, why are they trying so desperately hard to be more Catholic than the Popes of global capitalism – who have all suddenly discovered the wisdom that state intervention secures national economies like nothing else, including “free markets”, does?
Hmmm, Ghana - enti yeawiaye paa enia? Hmmm, eyeasem oo: asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
HALT THE CARNAGE IN EASTERN DR CONGO – AND SAVE THE CONGOLESE FROM RWANDA’S RAPACIOUS AND RUTHLESS TUTSI RULING ELITE, NOW!
The slaughter and barbarity going on in North Kivu province of the DR Congo, is simply to enable the forces of the self-styled “General” Laurent Nkunda’s National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP), act to protect the Rwandan ruling elites’ continued access to the mineral wealth of the area.
They are worried about a deal in which the government in Kinshasa just recently signed a $5bn agreement with China - which gives China access to the region’s minerals.
In I996 General Paul Kagame’s Rwandan Patriotic Front forces crossed the border into Eastern DR Congo, in pursuit of the “genociders”, the Hutu militiamen and former Rwandan soldiers who now constitute the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR).
However, the RPF forces went straight to the mines of the region - rather than pursue the Rwandan Hutu “genociders” (a nonce word that Rwanda’s clever ruling Tutsi elite and Nkunda have patented - and have world intellectual property rights to!).
Clearly, Paul Kagame, the archetypal brutal and cunning African military dictator (now masquerading as a democratically-elected civilian president of the invisible prison and apartheid state that Rwanda has become), who forever dreams of amassing wealth, had no intention of missing the opportunity to pillage the wealth of DR Congo.
Those who now make up the FDLR did not interest him then – and they do not interest him now: they are merely a useful cloak to hide the Rwandan ruling political and business elites' true mission in the DR Congo: raping the mineral wealth of their hapless neighbour.
Pillaging DR Congo’s mineral wealth is now the core business and cash-cow of Rwanda’s ruling elites - who have never ceased doing so, since the day Paul Kagame made a beeline for the mines of the region in 1996. It has made them all very wealthy individually: and swollen the Rwandan military’s bank balance, no end.
Their DR Congo puppet, the ruthless Laurent Nkunda, is kept supplied with men and arms - to guarantee that access. An accurate job description of the self-styled “General” Laurent Nkunda, (who hypocritically talks endlessly about “protecting” DR Congo’s “Tutsi population”), would therefore be: “warlord and stooge-protector” whose military mission is protecting Rwanda’s political and business elites’ lucrative mining enterprises in the eastern part of DR Congo.
To help save their unfettered access to their wholly-owned subsidiary, the DR Congo treasure-trove, which the vast mineral wealth of the region represents for them, their stooge, the ruthless and cunning Nkunda, has once more deployed his perfect ready-made excuse (one that in a world enfeebled by cowardly political correctness, he knows will ensure that no one will dare object publicly to) - his ‘mission’ of “protecting DR Congo’s Tutsis.”
France must quickly come to the assistance of the legitimate and elected government of the DR Congo in Kinshasa, led by the elected President Joseph Kabila, by deploying its Foreign Legion in Eastern DR. Congo.
The UN would do far more good in DR Congo if it approached the US military's Africa Command, AFRICOM (which claims that it has been set up to help in just such African humanitarian emergencies – so must clearly be anxious to grab such a golden opportunity, presumably!) to help them airlift all of the Rwandan Hutu refugees to new specially-built refugee camps in Western DR Congo, as quickly as it is practicable to do so: and permanently remove Rwanda's (and Nkunda's) perfect exuse for the CNDP's treasonable and criminal actions.
The EU and the UN must also make it clear to landlocked Rwanda that they will impose economic sanctions on it if it does not halt its continued support of the renegade Nkunda – whom the International Criminal Court (ICC) ought to indict for war crimes and crimes against humanity, as soon as it is possible to do so!
The sole reason for the current upsurge in fighting, is the new $5bn agreement between the DR Congo government and China (which gives China access to the region’s minerals), which would present Nkunda and the Rwanda’s ruling elites with a powerful competitor: and end their lucrative monopoly in the mining industry of the region.
In other words, the Rwandan ruling political and business elites, have ordered their warlord, the quisling (and their stooge and partner in crime), Laurent Nkunda, to create a crisis that will bring the DR. Congo government to the negotiating table – so that a deal can be "cut" that will give them a piece of the proverbial pie: the region's mineral resources - such as gold and coltan, which is used to make mobile phones.
How can the African Union (AU), the United Nations (UN)and the rest of the world, watch this slaughter of innocents, without stopping Nkunda in his tracks - and for good? Have the citizens of that part of DR Congo not suffered enough - in a holocaust-nation in which over 5 million Africans have lost their lives since 1998?
Why must innocent Africans continue suffering - just so that Rwanda’s wealthy and greedy elite can continue making hundreds of millions of dollars: to fund the obscene and expensive African version of the Hollywood celebrity-lifestyles they have become accustomed to: at the expense of the hapless citizens of eastern DR. Congo?
It is clear, that ultimately, Nkunda and his Rwandan paymasters (whose offensive "reverse-racism" in their unjustified sense of superiority over the Hutus in their country, is similar in nature to the arrogance of South Africa’s Boers during the apartheid era) would like to secede from DR Congo – and realize their collective dream of creating a Tutsi nation by unraveling the results on the ground, in the Great Lakes region, of European colonialism in Africa.
Nkunda’s junior brother Captain Seco alluded to that fact in a speech he recently gave. For the sake of peace and stability of the whole of Africa, they must never be allowed to succeed!
They are worried about a deal in which the government in Kinshasa just recently signed a $5bn agreement with China - which gives China access to the region’s minerals.
In I996 General Paul Kagame’s Rwandan Patriotic Front forces crossed the border into Eastern DR Congo, in pursuit of the “genociders”, the Hutu militiamen and former Rwandan soldiers who now constitute the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR).
However, the RPF forces went straight to the mines of the region - rather than pursue the Rwandan Hutu “genociders” (a nonce word that Rwanda’s clever ruling Tutsi elite and Nkunda have patented - and have world intellectual property rights to!).
Clearly, Paul Kagame, the archetypal brutal and cunning African military dictator (now masquerading as a democratically-elected civilian president of the invisible prison and apartheid state that Rwanda has become), who forever dreams of amassing wealth, had no intention of missing the opportunity to pillage the wealth of DR Congo.
Those who now make up the FDLR did not interest him then – and they do not interest him now: they are merely a useful cloak to hide the Rwandan ruling political and business elites' true mission in the DR Congo: raping the mineral wealth of their hapless neighbour.
Pillaging DR Congo’s mineral wealth is now the core business and cash-cow of Rwanda’s ruling elites - who have never ceased doing so, since the day Paul Kagame made a beeline for the mines of the region in 1996. It has made them all very wealthy individually: and swollen the Rwandan military’s bank balance, no end.
Their DR Congo puppet, the ruthless Laurent Nkunda, is kept supplied with men and arms - to guarantee that access. An accurate job description of the self-styled “General” Laurent Nkunda, (who hypocritically talks endlessly about “protecting” DR Congo’s “Tutsi population”), would therefore be: “warlord and stooge-protector” whose military mission is protecting Rwanda’s political and business elites’ lucrative mining enterprises in the eastern part of DR Congo.
To help save their unfettered access to their wholly-owned subsidiary, the DR Congo treasure-trove, which the vast mineral wealth of the region represents for them, their stooge, the ruthless and cunning Nkunda, has once more deployed his perfect ready-made excuse (one that in a world enfeebled by cowardly political correctness, he knows will ensure that no one will dare object publicly to) - his ‘mission’ of “protecting DR Congo’s Tutsis.”
France must quickly come to the assistance of the legitimate and elected government of the DR Congo in Kinshasa, led by the elected President Joseph Kabila, by deploying its Foreign Legion in Eastern DR. Congo.
The UN would do far more good in DR Congo if it approached the US military's Africa Command, AFRICOM (which claims that it has been set up to help in just such African humanitarian emergencies – so must clearly be anxious to grab such a golden opportunity, presumably!) to help them airlift all of the Rwandan Hutu refugees to new specially-built refugee camps in Western DR Congo, as quickly as it is practicable to do so: and permanently remove Rwanda's (and Nkunda's) perfect exuse for the CNDP's treasonable and criminal actions.
The EU and the UN must also make it clear to landlocked Rwanda that they will impose economic sanctions on it if it does not halt its continued support of the renegade Nkunda – whom the International Criminal Court (ICC) ought to indict for war crimes and crimes against humanity, as soon as it is possible to do so!
The sole reason for the current upsurge in fighting, is the new $5bn agreement between the DR Congo government and China (which gives China access to the region’s minerals), which would present Nkunda and the Rwanda’s ruling elites with a powerful competitor: and end their lucrative monopoly in the mining industry of the region.
In other words, the Rwandan ruling political and business elites, have ordered their warlord, the quisling (and their stooge and partner in crime), Laurent Nkunda, to create a crisis that will bring the DR. Congo government to the negotiating table – so that a deal can be "cut" that will give them a piece of the proverbial pie: the region's mineral resources - such as gold and coltan, which is used to make mobile phones.
How can the African Union (AU), the United Nations (UN)and the rest of the world, watch this slaughter of innocents, without stopping Nkunda in his tracks - and for good? Have the citizens of that part of DR Congo not suffered enough - in a holocaust-nation in which over 5 million Africans have lost their lives since 1998?
Why must innocent Africans continue suffering - just so that Rwanda’s wealthy and greedy elite can continue making hundreds of millions of dollars: to fund the obscene and expensive African version of the Hollywood celebrity-lifestyles they have become accustomed to: at the expense of the hapless citizens of eastern DR. Congo?
It is clear, that ultimately, Nkunda and his Rwandan paymasters (whose offensive "reverse-racism" in their unjustified sense of superiority over the Hutus in their country, is similar in nature to the arrogance of South Africa’s Boers during the apartheid era) would like to secede from DR Congo – and realize their collective dream of creating a Tutsi nation by unraveling the results on the ground, in the Great Lakes region, of European colonialism in Africa.
Nkunda’s junior brother Captain Seco alluded to that fact in a speech he recently gave. For the sake of peace and stability of the whole of Africa, they must never be allowed to succeed!
Friday, 7 November 2008
Re: "Kufuor’s Ignominious Last Days!"
Nana Biakoye, I refer to your article entitled "Kufuor’s Ignominious Last Days!" which appeared in the general news web page of www.ghanaweb.com, on Friday 7th November, 2008. Massa, the root causes of the evil known as corruption within our political class, are many and varied, indeed - and you must not forget that corruption did not start today, either.
Hmmm, Ghana – eyeasem oo: God, Ghanaians are such an interesting people. Massa, we are sleepwalking to a future catastrophe - by pretending that political parties, which are in the business of fighting to win political power, can do so by solely relying on moneyed-folk (a majority of who are tax-dodging crooks, if truth be told!).
That sad end, of the gentleman you make so many allegations of corruption about, and catalogue, is precisely what will be the fate of all our presidents, eventually - if we do not give up the fantasy that political parties can produce honest leaders if they are held to ransom by the crooked investors who fund them.
Have you seen any of the gentlemen vying to be the next president of our country rushing to publicly publish the assets of themselves and their spouses? Have you heard any of them telling us that they will, in addition, also demand that all the appointees to public office that they make during their tenure, will be forced by them to do same, too: before and after their tenure in office? Ditto the spouses of those appointees?
The greed for money of those of the members of our political class, whom the virus of corruption afflicts, and which manifests itself so palpably, during the latter stages of their tenure, starts off its journey of a zillion deceptions, driven solely by their need to seek funds for their political parties - to enable them entrench themselves in power: for as long as it is possible to do so.
Massa, just how do you expect them to keep the large army of party foot-soldiers and sundry hangers-on, sweet and content, if they do not resort to crooked ways to build up a war chest sufficiently large to keep them in power, for as long as it is possible for them to get away with fooling the nation - compromising various sections of Ghanaian society: by buying their consciences: and keeping them quiet that way, in the process?
Why do you think there are so many praise-singing regime "guard-dogs" in the media firmament of our country, today? Yet, they are supposed to be fearless professionals who represent the fourth branch of government: society's watchdogs in genuine democracies.
Massa, no one really goes into office wanting to end up disgracing themselves and their family clans, by becoming common crooks, so as to enable them continue holding on to political power, believe me.
For as long as we are unable to understand that it is far better for the Ghanaian nation-state to fund political parties, so shall we continue seeing the tragedy of decent men and women ending up becoming corrupt individuals, when they win power in our country, Massa.
Yet, if we are creative enough, it will definitely not cost us that much to fund political parties in our country. For example, we do know that virtually all Ghanaians trace their political roots to the Busia-Danquah and Nkrumaist political traditions.
Well, if so, why don't we take advantage of that fact - and in the process also get the satisfaction of being able to say no to the continuing legitimisation of the handiwork of coup-makers, by simply amending our constitution: and limiting political parties in our country, to just the two political parties that can trace their roots, directly, to those two traditions?
If we let the Ghanaian nation-state fund them, will that not help keep them out of the grip of the crooked moneyed-folk who invest in them for a profitable return on their tainted outlays, permanently?
Yet another example of funding political parties at very little cost might be by letting them have rent-free access to the property portfolio of the Ghanaian nation-state. As we all know, the Ghanaian nation-state has thousands of public buildings across our country. Why don't we make district assembly administration office space available to the two officially recognised parties - to use as their district headquarters? Ditto regional administration buildings to serve as their regional headquarters offices?
Going forward into the future, why not make the provision of office space around the country available to them in purpose-built buildings - which we factor into our development planning budgets? If they are forced to share office accommodation, will they not perhaps even begin to see each other as ordinary everyday people - rather than as sadists and monsters incapable of positive thinking about each other?
For as long as we do not act to remove the need for our politicians to look for money to fund their parties, so shall we end up with the tragedy of seeing good human beings who come to power hoping to improve our country, only ending up working to get kickbacks to finance their party - and who then become infected by a variant of the unfathomable-greed virus known as “chopping Ghana small.”
Massa, the tragedy of the important personage of whom you speak, is the same as the tragedy of the hero of June 4th 1979 - who is forever telling Ghanaians the incredible story that his “friends” have funded the expensive education and the living expenses of his dear children, overseas.
Can you imagine just how apoplectic he and his fellow coup-makers would have been if General Acheampong and Co. had told AFRC “investigators” this Kweku Ananse story? Massa, the root causes of corruption are many, indeed - and it is a tragedy that engulfs much of our political class, unfortunately!
Hmmm, Ghana - enti ye ewiaye paa, enia? Asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
Hmmm, Ghana – eyeasem oo: God, Ghanaians are such an interesting people. Massa, we are sleepwalking to a future catastrophe - by pretending that political parties, which are in the business of fighting to win political power, can do so by solely relying on moneyed-folk (a majority of who are tax-dodging crooks, if truth be told!).
That sad end, of the gentleman you make so many allegations of corruption about, and catalogue, is precisely what will be the fate of all our presidents, eventually - if we do not give up the fantasy that political parties can produce honest leaders if they are held to ransom by the crooked investors who fund them.
Have you seen any of the gentlemen vying to be the next president of our country rushing to publicly publish the assets of themselves and their spouses? Have you heard any of them telling us that they will, in addition, also demand that all the appointees to public office that they make during their tenure, will be forced by them to do same, too: before and after their tenure in office? Ditto the spouses of those appointees?
The greed for money of those of the members of our political class, whom the virus of corruption afflicts, and which manifests itself so palpably, during the latter stages of their tenure, starts off its journey of a zillion deceptions, driven solely by their need to seek funds for their political parties - to enable them entrench themselves in power: for as long as it is possible to do so.
Massa, just how do you expect them to keep the large army of party foot-soldiers and sundry hangers-on, sweet and content, if they do not resort to crooked ways to build up a war chest sufficiently large to keep them in power, for as long as it is possible for them to get away with fooling the nation - compromising various sections of Ghanaian society: by buying their consciences: and keeping them quiet that way, in the process?
Why do you think there are so many praise-singing regime "guard-dogs" in the media firmament of our country, today? Yet, they are supposed to be fearless professionals who represent the fourth branch of government: society's watchdogs in genuine democracies.
Massa, no one really goes into office wanting to end up disgracing themselves and their family clans, by becoming common crooks, so as to enable them continue holding on to political power, believe me.
For as long as we are unable to understand that it is far better for the Ghanaian nation-state to fund political parties, so shall we continue seeing the tragedy of decent men and women ending up becoming corrupt individuals, when they win power in our country, Massa.
Yet, if we are creative enough, it will definitely not cost us that much to fund political parties in our country. For example, we do know that virtually all Ghanaians trace their political roots to the Busia-Danquah and Nkrumaist political traditions.
Well, if so, why don't we take advantage of that fact - and in the process also get the satisfaction of being able to say no to the continuing legitimisation of the handiwork of coup-makers, by simply amending our constitution: and limiting political parties in our country, to just the two political parties that can trace their roots, directly, to those two traditions?
If we let the Ghanaian nation-state fund them, will that not help keep them out of the grip of the crooked moneyed-folk who invest in them for a profitable return on their tainted outlays, permanently?
Yet another example of funding political parties at very little cost might be by letting them have rent-free access to the property portfolio of the Ghanaian nation-state. As we all know, the Ghanaian nation-state has thousands of public buildings across our country. Why don't we make district assembly administration office space available to the two officially recognised parties - to use as their district headquarters? Ditto regional administration buildings to serve as their regional headquarters offices?
Going forward into the future, why not make the provision of office space around the country available to them in purpose-built buildings - which we factor into our development planning budgets? If they are forced to share office accommodation, will they not perhaps even begin to see each other as ordinary everyday people - rather than as sadists and monsters incapable of positive thinking about each other?
For as long as we do not act to remove the need for our politicians to look for money to fund their parties, so shall we end up with the tragedy of seeing good human beings who come to power hoping to improve our country, only ending up working to get kickbacks to finance their party - and who then become infected by a variant of the unfathomable-greed virus known as “chopping Ghana small.”
Massa, the tragedy of the important personage of whom you speak, is the same as the tragedy of the hero of June 4th 1979 - who is forever telling Ghanaians the incredible story that his “friends” have funded the expensive education and the living expenses of his dear children, overseas.
Can you imagine just how apoplectic he and his fellow coup-makers would have been if General Acheampong and Co. had told AFRC “investigators” this Kweku Ananse story? Massa, the root causes of corruption are many, indeed - and it is a tragedy that engulfs much of our political class, unfortunately!
Hmmm, Ghana - enti ye ewiaye paa, enia? Asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
Wednesday, 5 November 2008
TRADITIONAL RULERS HAVE NO FUTURE IN ANY GHANAIAN MERITOCRACY!
Opanin, relax - when the number of Ghanaians with the "serf-mentality" (the main factor that enables the institution of chieftaincy to still survive in modern-day Ghana!) dwindles, we shall finally rid our nation of that evil miasma – that, sadly, clouds the worldview of those who are beholden to it. We shall then see the back of today's progeny of those blood-sucking parasites from our pre-colonial feudal past.
Opanin, believe me, that day will come sooner than you think! For those sentimental souls in our midst who think that we would be bereft without them, perhaps we can simply substitute the phrase "Ghana Omanpanin" for the word "president" in our constitution.
We can then operate on the assumption that every Ghanaian citizen is a "royal" (what an absurd word and concept - for anyone who believes in a meritocracy: for whom inherited privilege is the worst enemy of progress!) and can therefore be elected as a "Ghana Omanpanin".
We should then line up all traditional rulers to pay tribute and swear an oath of allegiance to the “Ghana Omanpanin” whenever he or she begins his/her tenure and is sworn into office. We should simply make that a constitutional requirement and let that be the basis for their legal recognition in our country. Period.
Perhaps we can begin by insisting that any important visitor to our shores, who wants to meet our traditional rulers, can do so only in private - and without any publicizing of the event by our local media, under any circumstances. Period. We must not provide the megalomaniacs amongst them with the oxygen of publicity - especially those of them who see their role today as the revivers of the sovereign power of their predecessors.
Can you imagine a more treasonable dream and goal for any Ghanaian citizen to have? Is it not an outrage that a man we elected to be the president of the Republic of Ghana, has actively used the machinery of state to encourage this treasonable ambition of his favourite tribal chiefs, throughout his tenure?
Incidentally, have you noticed how they have now switched to manipulating the Ga Manste - as a pawn in their game of using state resources to promote the favourite tribal chiefs of our "Hypocrite-in-Chief" (as the more uncharitable of his critics call our current president! )?
They are now arranging for august visitors (those who aren’t so important and are incapable of funding projects!), to call on the Ga Mantse - as a sop to their critics: who charge that they are using state resources to promote the president’s favourite traditional rulers. What perfidy!
Hmmm, Ghana - eyeasem oo: asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
Opanin, believe me, that day will come sooner than you think! For those sentimental souls in our midst who think that we would be bereft without them, perhaps we can simply substitute the phrase "Ghana Omanpanin" for the word "president" in our constitution.
We can then operate on the assumption that every Ghanaian citizen is a "royal" (what an absurd word and concept - for anyone who believes in a meritocracy: for whom inherited privilege is the worst enemy of progress!) and can therefore be elected as a "Ghana Omanpanin".
We should then line up all traditional rulers to pay tribute and swear an oath of allegiance to the “Ghana Omanpanin” whenever he or she begins his/her tenure and is sworn into office. We should simply make that a constitutional requirement and let that be the basis for their legal recognition in our country. Period.
Perhaps we can begin by insisting that any important visitor to our shores, who wants to meet our traditional rulers, can do so only in private - and without any publicizing of the event by our local media, under any circumstances. Period. We must not provide the megalomaniacs amongst them with the oxygen of publicity - especially those of them who see their role today as the revivers of the sovereign power of their predecessors.
Can you imagine a more treasonable dream and goal for any Ghanaian citizen to have? Is it not an outrage that a man we elected to be the president of the Republic of Ghana, has actively used the machinery of state to encourage this treasonable ambition of his favourite tribal chiefs, throughout his tenure?
Incidentally, have you noticed how they have now switched to manipulating the Ga Manste - as a pawn in their game of using state resources to promote the favourite tribal chiefs of our "Hypocrite-in-Chief" (as the more uncharitable of his critics call our current president! )?
They are now arranging for august visitors (those who aren’t so important and are incapable of funding projects!), to call on the Ga Mantse - as a sop to their critics: who charge that they are using state resources to promote the president’s favourite traditional rulers. What perfidy!
Hmmm, Ghana - eyeasem oo: asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
General "Narcissus" Nkunda: Butcher of North Kivu and Conqueror of D.R. Congo! - A free verse poem by Kofi Thompson
He is a self-styled "General"
Whose crimes against humanity
Make those of the Bosnian Serb
General Mladich who is facing trial
For crimes against humanity
In the International Criminal Court
Pale into insignificance
Yet this Tutsi "General" Nkunda
Is responsible for slowly killing
A whole nation the size of Western Europe
In a brutal civil war that is backed
By his co-conspirator
The Tutsi General Paul Kagame
President if the fear-laden prison called Rwanda
In reality an unjust society
An apartheid state in which the minority dominates the majority
Over which he presides and represses
With cunning, fear and cruelty
And now flush with cash
From their vast mining enterprises in Eastern D.R. Congo
They now seek to make all of DR Congo their wholly-owned subsidiary
And along the way to their goal
What does it matter that they are war-mongering
On an epic scale with misery
A gang-rape here and a little pogrom there
They are advancing towards their objective
With total impunity as they carry out their occupation
Of an African nation with untold wealth and unimaginable riches
The grand prize for tiny battle-hardened Rwanda
The unjust society that no one In a world of political correctness
In which truth dare not speak can touch him
Because once upon a time
Kagame's people were the victims of "genociders"
Their very own special-purpose nonce word
To which they have intellectual property rights worldwide
Brutality on an Apocalyptic scale
Puugh!
A mere stamp in their passport to the super-riches of the D.R. Congo
A giant of nation the size of Western Europe
Soon-to-be vassal a of tiny Rwanda
Through the agency of tall and handsome General "Narcissus" himself
The almighty "General" Nkunda who is getting away with the murder
Of a whole nation because he is a Tutsi
"General" Nkunda
Self-styled
Completely
In love
With his fantastic self
Soon-to-be head of state of DR Congo
His Excellency
Butcher of North Kivu
Stooge of General Paul Kagame
Strongman extraordinaire
Hypocrite supreme
Soon-to-be billionaire partners in the wholly-owned
Rwandan privately-owned subsidiary corporation D.R. Congo
With Tutsi "General" "Narcissus" Nkunda
Fearless and untouchable warlord
Completely in love with his own very handsome face
Masturbating daily whiles fantasising
About the unimaginable wealth that awaits him
And his mass-murdering business partner General Paul Kagame
His Excellency
The President of the Republic of Rwanda
And soon-to-bebOverlord
Of the main prize
The main chance
The Democratic Republic of the Congo
Where he intends to follow in the footsteps
Of King Leopold of the Belgians
And participate in the brutal gang-rape that beautiful D.R. Congo
With "General" Nkunda
His Excellency
Soon-to-be President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo
Case closed
Sod the international community
Where were they when Hutus were murdering us Tutsis
Why should they murmur when we are only killing
A few hundred thousand here
And just making
A few millions miserable over there?
What does it matter that over 5 million Africans have died
From endless battles
Hunger
Sickness
Misery
Broken-hearts
Since 1998
We are conquerors of the Great Lakes Region
Salute us
We are untouchable
We are invincible
We are tall handsome Tutsi Generals
Do not dare
Speak French to us
Because we have indicted the French Establishment
For daring to insult us
But you can kiss our behinds
Thank you very much!
We are a couple of super-rich African dictators
We can make millions miserable
For they are mere pawns in our grand plans
We are very brave Tutsi warriors
We love fighting
And we do not fear the International Criminal Court
How many battalions and tanks do they have?
We are very handsome
So kiss our behinds
Thank you very much
Kinshasa here we come
Salute us
For our hour has finally come!
Whose crimes against humanity
Make those of the Bosnian Serb
General Mladich who is facing trial
For crimes against humanity
In the International Criminal Court
Pale into insignificance
Yet this Tutsi "General" Nkunda
Is responsible for slowly killing
A whole nation the size of Western Europe
In a brutal civil war that is backed
By his co-conspirator
The Tutsi General Paul Kagame
President if the fear-laden prison called Rwanda
In reality an unjust society
An apartheid state in which the minority dominates the majority
Over which he presides and represses
With cunning, fear and cruelty
And now flush with cash
From their vast mining enterprises in Eastern D.R. Congo
They now seek to make all of DR Congo their wholly-owned subsidiary
And along the way to their goal
What does it matter that they are war-mongering
On an epic scale with misery
A gang-rape here and a little pogrom there
They are advancing towards their objective
With total impunity as they carry out their occupation
Of an African nation with untold wealth and unimaginable riches
The grand prize for tiny battle-hardened Rwanda
The unjust society that no one In a world of political correctness
In which truth dare not speak can touch him
Because once upon a time
Kagame's people were the victims of "genociders"
Their very own special-purpose nonce word
To which they have intellectual property rights worldwide
Brutality on an Apocalyptic scale
Puugh!
A mere stamp in their passport to the super-riches of the D.R. Congo
A giant of nation the size of Western Europe
Soon-to-be vassal a of tiny Rwanda
Through the agency of tall and handsome General "Narcissus" himself
The almighty "General" Nkunda who is getting away with the murder
Of a whole nation because he is a Tutsi
"General" Nkunda
Self-styled
Completely
In love
With his fantastic self
Soon-to-be head of state of DR Congo
His Excellency
Butcher of North Kivu
Stooge of General Paul Kagame
Strongman extraordinaire
Hypocrite supreme
Soon-to-be billionaire partners in the wholly-owned
Rwandan privately-owned subsidiary corporation D.R. Congo
With Tutsi "General" "Narcissus" Nkunda
Fearless and untouchable warlord
Completely in love with his own very handsome face
Masturbating daily whiles fantasising
About the unimaginable wealth that awaits him
And his mass-murdering business partner General Paul Kagame
His Excellency
The President of the Republic of Rwanda
And soon-to-bebOverlord
Of the main prize
The main chance
The Democratic Republic of the Congo
Where he intends to follow in the footsteps
Of King Leopold of the Belgians
And participate in the brutal gang-rape that beautiful D.R. Congo
With "General" Nkunda
His Excellency
Soon-to-be President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo
Case closed
Sod the international community
Where were they when Hutus were murdering us Tutsis
Why should they murmur when we are only killing
A few hundred thousand here
And just making
A few millions miserable over there?
What does it matter that over 5 million Africans have died
From endless battles
Hunger
Sickness
Misery
Broken-hearts
Since 1998
We are conquerors of the Great Lakes Region
Salute us
We are untouchable
We are invincible
We are tall handsome Tutsi Generals
Do not dare
Speak French to us
Because we have indicted the French Establishment
For daring to insult us
But you can kiss our behinds
Thank you very much!
We are a couple of super-rich African dictators
We can make millions miserable
For they are mere pawns in our grand plans
We are very brave Tutsi warriors
We love fighting
And we do not fear the International Criminal Court
How many battalions and tanks do they have?
We are very handsome
So kiss our behinds
Thank you very much
Kinshasa here we come
Salute us
For our hour has finally come!
Tuesday, 4 November 2008
Younger Generation Of Ghanaians Will Never Allow Their Nation's Hydrocarbon Wealth To Enrich Fatcat Shareholders Of Foreign Oil Companies!
Quote: "President Kufuor noted with satisfaction the increased level of contact and co-operation between Ghana and the Caribbean state. Recently, Ghana's Minister of Energy travelled to Trinidad and Tobago, which has been in the oil production business for more than 100 years, to study how it has been managing its oil resources." - Accra, Nov.3, Ghana News Agency)
Our political class - across the spectrum - apparently doesn’t get it: The younger generation of Ghanaians, who, thank God, don't think in terms of tribe and party, because they do not have the narrow worldview of the older generation of "My-party-my-tribe-right-or-wrong" myrmidon-types so preponderant in the older generation of Ghanaians, want Ghana, not the fatcat private shareholders of foreign oil and natural gas companies living in the wealthy nations of the West, to benefit from Ghana's hydrocarbon wealth.
They see our finite and exhausting hydrocarbon resources as Ghana's last opportunity to transform itself into Africa's equivalent of the egalitarian societies of Scandinavia.
Consequently, they have no intention of allowing the business as usual scenario, in which men and women, afflicted with the slave-mentality one sees driving so many of Ghana’s educated urban elites, who are the lackeys of Western capitalism and stooges for neo-colonialism to compete amongst themselves to see who can bend over backwards the most, to empower foreign carpetbaggers to enable them get hold of our nation's wealth, in the name of “private-sector led growth” and so-called “foreign direct investment” (read: gang-raping mother Ghana, with foreign “friends-with-benefits”!), to be played out yet again, in the exploitation of our oil and natural gas deposits.
Whiles those with the slave-mentality, the lackeys of Western capitalism and stooges for neocolonialism amongst our political and business elites work hard day and night to collaborate with foreigners, whom they move heaven and earth to provide an enabling environment for, the younger generation of clued-on Ghanaians in all fields of human endeavour, amongst them, some of our very well-educated young military officers with a social conscience (rather than the “grab-all-the-wealth-you-can-whiles-you-can” mentality of some senior officers - including some top commanders - according to the bush telegraph: not poor old me!), are also working hard day and night, towards the new 5th Republican era.
In that new era of true and genuine democracy, one based on the real freedoms of ordinary people and their right to a safe, secure and happy existence (including the right to benefit in practical, “good-quality-of-life” terms from all of Ghana’s wealth) in the land of their birth, Ghana, Ghanaians will look to using the approach of nations like Venezuela under President Hugo Chavez (not to the lackeys of Western imperialism in the Caribbean!), for the most effective formula in maximizing value from Ghana’s oil and natural gas deposits.
They are completely fed up with the one-sided arrangements of the past, which have seen our gold, diamonds, manganese and other natural resources go to benefit foreigners, whiles we pick up the crumbs, and have to deal with the environmental consequences of the "free-for-all” wealth creation opportunities we open up for foreign commercial entities given leave to plunder our natural resources, at will.
Their preferred business model is a state-to-state one, in which the Ghanaian and Chinese governments agree that there will be joint-ventures between their state-owned hydrocarbon entities.
Thus the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) will have a 70 per cent stake with the best-resourced of the Chinese state-owned oil and natural gas companies having a 30 per cent stake - and provide all the working capital (and at all material times, actively make technology transfers, to GNPC and its staff!). Ghana will in turn issue sovereign bonds to the government of China in lieu of paying its share of working capital upfront.
Those young Ghanaians are even prepared to die, if necessary, to fight to ensure that this windfall and gift from providence is used solely to transform Ghanaian society.
They want to transform Ghanaian society from the present “dog-eat-dog” selfishness, in which the crooked and the politically well-connected thrive (and have the gall and effrontery to insult those without opportunity: by calling them “lazy” and “envious”!), whiles the rest of society is progressively impoverished, into Africa’s equivalent of the Scandinavian societies of Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland.
They simply do not want our oil and natural deposits, to turn Ghana into a nation of a thousand family clans who are dollar-billionaires and 25.9 million impoverished family clans. Debi da - embasu da ewo Ghana ha sei!
So let the lackeys of Western capitalism and the stooges for neo-colonialism join hands, and work hard day and night deluding themselves that their special purpose offshore companies are in for boom times - and work even harder still creating the enabling environment for their collaborators (the foreign capitalist entities and sundry foreign front-men and women who are their secret business partners in those opaque offshore joint-ventures in tax havens around the world - including the Caribbean!).
In spite of their best efforts, Ghana will never become another African tragedy like Nigeria, in which a few super-wealthy Ghanaians benefit from their collaboration with foreigners to exploit our hydrocarbon resources, for their mutual benefit.
Let the few powerful crooks amongst our leaders and Ghana’s educated urban elites, take notice. They had better revise their notes quickly - for, the 5th Republican era is on the horizon: and good, honest, principled, decent-minded and patriotic Ghanaians are also working pretty hard day and night, to help usher in that era of real democracy and a just and fair society for all Ghanaians - Africa’s equivalent of the Scandinavian societies!
Hmmm Ghana, enti ye ewiaye paa enia? Asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
Our political class - across the spectrum - apparently doesn’t get it: The younger generation of Ghanaians, who, thank God, don't think in terms of tribe and party, because they do not have the narrow worldview of the older generation of "My-party-my-tribe-right-or-wrong" myrmidon-types so preponderant in the older generation of Ghanaians, want Ghana, not the fatcat private shareholders of foreign oil and natural gas companies living in the wealthy nations of the West, to benefit from Ghana's hydrocarbon wealth.
They see our finite and exhausting hydrocarbon resources as Ghana's last opportunity to transform itself into Africa's equivalent of the egalitarian societies of Scandinavia.
Consequently, they have no intention of allowing the business as usual scenario, in which men and women, afflicted with the slave-mentality one sees driving so many of Ghana’s educated urban elites, who are the lackeys of Western capitalism and stooges for neo-colonialism to compete amongst themselves to see who can bend over backwards the most, to empower foreign carpetbaggers to enable them get hold of our nation's wealth, in the name of “private-sector led growth” and so-called “foreign direct investment” (read: gang-raping mother Ghana, with foreign “friends-with-benefits”!), to be played out yet again, in the exploitation of our oil and natural gas deposits.
Whiles those with the slave-mentality, the lackeys of Western capitalism and stooges for neocolonialism amongst our political and business elites work hard day and night to collaborate with foreigners, whom they move heaven and earth to provide an enabling environment for, the younger generation of clued-on Ghanaians in all fields of human endeavour, amongst them, some of our very well-educated young military officers with a social conscience (rather than the “grab-all-the-wealth-you-can-whiles-you-can” mentality of some senior officers - including some top commanders - according to the bush telegraph: not poor old me!), are also working hard day and night, towards the new 5th Republican era.
In that new era of true and genuine democracy, one based on the real freedoms of ordinary people and their right to a safe, secure and happy existence (including the right to benefit in practical, “good-quality-of-life” terms from all of Ghana’s wealth) in the land of their birth, Ghana, Ghanaians will look to using the approach of nations like Venezuela under President Hugo Chavez (not to the lackeys of Western imperialism in the Caribbean!), for the most effective formula in maximizing value from Ghana’s oil and natural gas deposits.
They are completely fed up with the one-sided arrangements of the past, which have seen our gold, diamonds, manganese and other natural resources go to benefit foreigners, whiles we pick up the crumbs, and have to deal with the environmental consequences of the "free-for-all” wealth creation opportunities we open up for foreign commercial entities given leave to plunder our natural resources, at will.
Their preferred business model is a state-to-state one, in which the Ghanaian and Chinese governments agree that there will be joint-ventures between their state-owned hydrocarbon entities.
Thus the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) will have a 70 per cent stake with the best-resourced of the Chinese state-owned oil and natural gas companies having a 30 per cent stake - and provide all the working capital (and at all material times, actively make technology transfers, to GNPC and its staff!). Ghana will in turn issue sovereign bonds to the government of China in lieu of paying its share of working capital upfront.
Those young Ghanaians are even prepared to die, if necessary, to fight to ensure that this windfall and gift from providence is used solely to transform Ghanaian society.
They want to transform Ghanaian society from the present “dog-eat-dog” selfishness, in which the crooked and the politically well-connected thrive (and have the gall and effrontery to insult those without opportunity: by calling them “lazy” and “envious”!), whiles the rest of society is progressively impoverished, into Africa’s equivalent of the Scandinavian societies of Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland.
They simply do not want our oil and natural deposits, to turn Ghana into a nation of a thousand family clans who are dollar-billionaires and 25.9 million impoverished family clans. Debi da - embasu da ewo Ghana ha sei!
So let the lackeys of Western capitalism and the stooges for neo-colonialism join hands, and work hard day and night deluding themselves that their special purpose offshore companies are in for boom times - and work even harder still creating the enabling environment for their collaborators (the foreign capitalist entities and sundry foreign front-men and women who are their secret business partners in those opaque offshore joint-ventures in tax havens around the world - including the Caribbean!).
In spite of their best efforts, Ghana will never become another African tragedy like Nigeria, in which a few super-wealthy Ghanaians benefit from their collaboration with foreigners to exploit our hydrocarbon resources, for their mutual benefit.
Let the few powerful crooks amongst our leaders and Ghana’s educated urban elites, take notice. They had better revise their notes quickly - for, the 5th Republican era is on the horizon: and good, honest, principled, decent-minded and patriotic Ghanaians are also working pretty hard day and night, to help usher in that era of real democracy and a just and fair society for all Ghanaians - Africa’s equivalent of the Scandinavian societies!
Hmmm Ghana, enti ye ewiaye paa enia? Asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
Monday, 3 November 2008
Re: “Ghana’s GDP underestimated?”
"Dr Amoako said Ghana was 88th out or more than 100 countries in terms of infrastructural development and added that although the banking sector had become dynamic, accessing affordable credit was still a problem."
"He called for a dynamic shift in the economy and advocated that the government should be the nerve centre of economic transformation."
What a very wise man, this Dr. Amoako, is - for, in stating the importance of state intervention in the economy (something demonstrated so amply by Singapore, Malaysia and the regime of Dr. Kwame Nkrumah: all of whom used the power of the nation-state, to successfully build their nations), he hit the proverbial nail on the head, squarely.
Sadly, since the overthrow of Nkrumah, with the exception of the regime of General Acheampong, who used the power of the nation-state to empower Ghanaians, to seize "the commanding heights of the economy" and made us self-sufficient in food production (and even made it possible for us to be food exporters for a period in our history), we have had the amazing situation, in which although the men and women running our nation, live the life of Riley, at taxpayers' expense (with servants, and other living expense items such as fuel, water, electricity and telephone bills, all paid for, by hard-pressed taxpayers', many of whom can barely make ends meet, themselves); yet, even as they sponge off poor taxpayers, they still have the gall, to constantly denigrate the philosophy of state-intervention in the economy, in order to promote economic growth.
They have all been high-profile African apostles of "trickle-down-economics" - for whom the "free market" holds the key to our economic salvation: largely because that has been the mantra of their masters in the West.
Today, we have all seen how when the crunch came, and the very survival of their economies was threatened, those self-same neo-liberals in the West, did not hesitate in getting their nation-states to intervene massively, in their economies - using hundreds of billions of dollars of taxpayers' money, to bailout banks and other financial institutions: to ensure the survival of their national economies.
Incredibly, our own local version of the neo-liberals of the Western world, are still bent on following the now-discredited "Reagan/Thatcherism" free-market ideology, of their Western soul-mates (perhaps slave masters, would be a more appropriate phrase, to describe those lackeys of the West, and stooges for neo-colonialism, the uncharitable amongst us, might say!), so slavishly.
Uniquely, amongst the members of our political class, they are a group of Ghanaians, who are simply incapable of any original thinking - and prefer to follow their Western paymasters slavishly: and without any reservations, at all (their decision to reverse a policy designed to protect Ghana's poultry industry, just because it threatened a lucrative export market for businesses in the jurisdiction of their lords and masters in the West, being an egregious example of this foolishness!).
They are determined to use the “sleight-of hand” economic paradigm that (in spite of the impressive GDP figures it produces from time to time) really only benefits a powerful and politically well-connected few in our country - and in reality, is simply impoverishing our nation (as vital and strategic national assets are sold for values far below their real net worth, to foreign carpetbaggers) and our people.
Amazingly, those self-same souls amongst our ruling elites, who personally benefit tremendously from being subsidized by the Ghanaian nation-state, with their cornucopia of expensive perks funded by taxpayers, simply fail to see the undoubted benefits of state intervention - and its ability to empower African societies to create wealth that gives all citizens (not just a powerful few with greedy ambitions), a good quality of life.
Yet, the enormity of the task we face in our country is such that we have no alternative, but to use the power of the Ghanaian nation-state, if we are to create Africa's equivalent, of the egalitarian societies of Scandinavia – and move rapidly away from the present ghastly situation in our country: which is akin to that of the cruel and monstrous "robber-baron" days, when exploitative and selfish-capitalism, was at its apogee, in early 20th-century America.
Why, did our leaders not see the dramatic demonstration of the failure of the market of recent times, as the economies of the wealthy nations of the Western world, unraveled before our very eyes, at the speed of lightning? Are they not inspired by the empowering nature of state intervention - which has so dramatically been used by all of those major Western nations: to save their countries from ruination?
Do they not understand that it was the same unfathomable greed that we are witnessing here (by our local apostles of free markets and their favourite regime-crony oligarchs), that was indulged in for decades, by the major players, in the financial services sectors of Western nations, which caused their financial markets to meltdown so quickly, when their comeuppance finally came?
Today, as those wealthy nations gradually tip into recession, is it not patently clear to all, that that recession would have been far more catastrophic than even the Great Depression of the 1920's was, if their governments' hadn't had the good sense to put aside their ideological straightjacket of neo-liberalism, and intervened - acting rapidly to organize bailouts for their private financial institutions: with taxpayers’ money?
Just what will it take for the clueless masters of the universe into whose greedy, dishonest and incompetent hands, our country has now fallen, to think outside the box, for once - and move away from the “rigid-mental-box” that they are currently so sadly constricted by (figuratively speaking)?
If we do not come out of the shadow of conventional economic thinking (with its idiotic over-reliance on textbook theories about markets that aren't, and will never be, perfect, in the real world of the hell-holes of urban and rural Ghana), we shall continue to witness and experience the apparent paradox, of reading countless reports of glowing GDP growth rate figures, recorded in a country, in which, as the politically well-connected and powerful few, grow fabulously wealthier every day, ordinary people's quality of life, plummets: in inverse proportion to the stratospheric heights to which the personal net worth of those prospering mightily from those brilliant GDP growth rate figures, rises to.
No matter what the well-paid regime spin-doctors (including those benefiting from the nepotism of our “Hypocrite-in-Chief” in cushy sinecures as “minister councilors” in our diplomatic missions overseas!) tell us, and the world, the reality of our present circumstances, is that we are, in fact, a very poor developing nation, which is dependent on the charity of foreign donors - and is lumbered with the "trickle-down" paradigm of economic development that its clueless leaders insist on using to develop their nation - mostly because it personally benefits them, the scions of their family clans and their siblings, and the powerful and crooked, tax-dodging, regime-oligarchs.
Ordinary people will simply tell you, if you ask them, dear reader, that the prosperity of the SUV owners driving into town from their Hollywood-style mansions, in Ghana’s swankiest suburbs, has unfortunately eluded them – and that in spite of the “rubbing-salt-into-wounds” insults of the dishonest and greedy ones amongst their leaders, who accuse them of being “lazy” and “envious”, they are neither: and simply await the same opportunities that those benefiting from the nepotism of our incompetent rulers, get, to come their way, too.
The present reliance on “sleight-of-hand” economics, with its mumbo-jumbo “trickle-down” ethos, is a recipe for disaster. We must think instead, of a greener sustainable development paradigm, which measures the progress of our nation in terms of the improvement of the quality of life of the vast majority of our people, as well as the preservation, at a time of global climate change, of our nation’s biodiversity.
We must stop deluding ourselves that because we can point to the super wealth of those who prosper in an iniquitous and inequitable system: one based on an ethos of greed and selfishness, it means that we are progressing. Period. Hmmm,Ghana - enti yeawiaye paa, enia?
Let us now touch briefly, dear reader, on the reported position of the spokesperson of the party in opposition, the National Democratic Congress (NDC), which the GNA report quotes, thus: “Mr Moses Asaga said the book set out the problems and promise into the future.
He said the United States government had demonstrated that state intervention was needed in the distribution of wealth.
He said the recent financial crisis in the global economy had given an indication that the market was not always right and underscored the need to move the economy from aid dependency.
On the emerging oil industry, Mr. Asaga called on the government to increase its stake in the industry beyond the payment of royalties.” End of quotation.
Well, at least Mr. Moses Asaga’s sentiments make sense to someone like me - and if his party, which also championed the lunacy of swallowing hook line and sinker, the self-serving strictures (of the accomplices in crime against Ghanaians and their nation: the agents of the Washington neo-liberal ideologues - led by the ruthless and anti-democratic Dick Cheney, the present US vice president), the World Bank and the IMF, when it was in power, now also apparently intends to follow some of the ideas Nkrumah espoused all those years ago, and used successfully, to build a more humane society (than the present “dog-eat-dog” madness, which is the defining characteristic, of our society today), then there is hope for our nation, yet, perhaps!
Hmmm, Ghana – eyeasem oo: asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
"He called for a dynamic shift in the economy and advocated that the government should be the nerve centre of economic transformation."
What a very wise man, this Dr. Amoako, is - for, in stating the importance of state intervention in the economy (something demonstrated so amply by Singapore, Malaysia and the regime of Dr. Kwame Nkrumah: all of whom used the power of the nation-state, to successfully build their nations), he hit the proverbial nail on the head, squarely.
Sadly, since the overthrow of Nkrumah, with the exception of the regime of General Acheampong, who used the power of the nation-state to empower Ghanaians, to seize "the commanding heights of the economy" and made us self-sufficient in food production (and even made it possible for us to be food exporters for a period in our history), we have had the amazing situation, in which although the men and women running our nation, live the life of Riley, at taxpayers' expense (with servants, and other living expense items such as fuel, water, electricity and telephone bills, all paid for, by hard-pressed taxpayers', many of whom can barely make ends meet, themselves); yet, even as they sponge off poor taxpayers, they still have the gall, to constantly denigrate the philosophy of state-intervention in the economy, in order to promote economic growth.
They have all been high-profile African apostles of "trickle-down-economics" - for whom the "free market" holds the key to our economic salvation: largely because that has been the mantra of their masters in the West.
Today, we have all seen how when the crunch came, and the very survival of their economies was threatened, those self-same neo-liberals in the West, did not hesitate in getting their nation-states to intervene massively, in their economies - using hundreds of billions of dollars of taxpayers' money, to bailout banks and other financial institutions: to ensure the survival of their national economies.
Incredibly, our own local version of the neo-liberals of the Western world, are still bent on following the now-discredited "Reagan/Thatcherism" free-market ideology, of their Western soul-mates (perhaps slave masters, would be a more appropriate phrase, to describe those lackeys of the West, and stooges for neo-colonialism, the uncharitable amongst us, might say!), so slavishly.
Uniquely, amongst the members of our political class, they are a group of Ghanaians, who are simply incapable of any original thinking - and prefer to follow their Western paymasters slavishly: and without any reservations, at all (their decision to reverse a policy designed to protect Ghana's poultry industry, just because it threatened a lucrative export market for businesses in the jurisdiction of their lords and masters in the West, being an egregious example of this foolishness!).
They are determined to use the “sleight-of hand” economic paradigm that (in spite of the impressive GDP figures it produces from time to time) really only benefits a powerful and politically well-connected few in our country - and in reality, is simply impoverishing our nation (as vital and strategic national assets are sold for values far below their real net worth, to foreign carpetbaggers) and our people.
Amazingly, those self-same souls amongst our ruling elites, who personally benefit tremendously from being subsidized by the Ghanaian nation-state, with their cornucopia of expensive perks funded by taxpayers, simply fail to see the undoubted benefits of state intervention - and its ability to empower African societies to create wealth that gives all citizens (not just a powerful few with greedy ambitions), a good quality of life.
Yet, the enormity of the task we face in our country is such that we have no alternative, but to use the power of the Ghanaian nation-state, if we are to create Africa's equivalent, of the egalitarian societies of Scandinavia – and move rapidly away from the present ghastly situation in our country: which is akin to that of the cruel and monstrous "robber-baron" days, when exploitative and selfish-capitalism, was at its apogee, in early 20th-century America.
Why, did our leaders not see the dramatic demonstration of the failure of the market of recent times, as the economies of the wealthy nations of the Western world, unraveled before our very eyes, at the speed of lightning? Are they not inspired by the empowering nature of state intervention - which has so dramatically been used by all of those major Western nations: to save their countries from ruination?
Do they not understand that it was the same unfathomable greed that we are witnessing here (by our local apostles of free markets and their favourite regime-crony oligarchs), that was indulged in for decades, by the major players, in the financial services sectors of Western nations, which caused their financial markets to meltdown so quickly, when their comeuppance finally came?
Today, as those wealthy nations gradually tip into recession, is it not patently clear to all, that that recession would have been far more catastrophic than even the Great Depression of the 1920's was, if their governments' hadn't had the good sense to put aside their ideological straightjacket of neo-liberalism, and intervened - acting rapidly to organize bailouts for their private financial institutions: with taxpayers’ money?
Just what will it take for the clueless masters of the universe into whose greedy, dishonest and incompetent hands, our country has now fallen, to think outside the box, for once - and move away from the “rigid-mental-box” that they are currently so sadly constricted by (figuratively speaking)?
If we do not come out of the shadow of conventional economic thinking (with its idiotic over-reliance on textbook theories about markets that aren't, and will never be, perfect, in the real world of the hell-holes of urban and rural Ghana), we shall continue to witness and experience the apparent paradox, of reading countless reports of glowing GDP growth rate figures, recorded in a country, in which, as the politically well-connected and powerful few, grow fabulously wealthier every day, ordinary people's quality of life, plummets: in inverse proportion to the stratospheric heights to which the personal net worth of those prospering mightily from those brilliant GDP growth rate figures, rises to.
No matter what the well-paid regime spin-doctors (including those benefiting from the nepotism of our “Hypocrite-in-Chief” in cushy sinecures as “minister councilors” in our diplomatic missions overseas!) tell us, and the world, the reality of our present circumstances, is that we are, in fact, a very poor developing nation, which is dependent on the charity of foreign donors - and is lumbered with the "trickle-down" paradigm of economic development that its clueless leaders insist on using to develop their nation - mostly because it personally benefits them, the scions of their family clans and their siblings, and the powerful and crooked, tax-dodging, regime-oligarchs.
Ordinary people will simply tell you, if you ask them, dear reader, that the prosperity of the SUV owners driving into town from their Hollywood-style mansions, in Ghana’s swankiest suburbs, has unfortunately eluded them – and that in spite of the “rubbing-salt-into-wounds” insults of the dishonest and greedy ones amongst their leaders, who accuse them of being “lazy” and “envious”, they are neither: and simply await the same opportunities that those benefiting from the nepotism of our incompetent rulers, get, to come their way, too.
The present reliance on “sleight-of-hand” economics, with its mumbo-jumbo “trickle-down” ethos, is a recipe for disaster. We must think instead, of a greener sustainable development paradigm, which measures the progress of our nation in terms of the improvement of the quality of life of the vast majority of our people, as well as the preservation, at a time of global climate change, of our nation’s biodiversity.
We must stop deluding ourselves that because we can point to the super wealth of those who prosper in an iniquitous and inequitable system: one based on an ethos of greed and selfishness, it means that we are progressing. Period. Hmmm,Ghana - enti yeawiaye paa, enia?
Let us now touch briefly, dear reader, on the reported position of the spokesperson of the party in opposition, the National Democratic Congress (NDC), which the GNA report quotes, thus: “Mr Moses Asaga said the book set out the problems and promise into the future.
He said the United States government had demonstrated that state intervention was needed in the distribution of wealth.
He said the recent financial crisis in the global economy had given an indication that the market was not always right and underscored the need to move the economy from aid dependency.
On the emerging oil industry, Mr. Asaga called on the government to increase its stake in the industry beyond the payment of royalties.” End of quotation.
Well, at least Mr. Moses Asaga’s sentiments make sense to someone like me - and if his party, which also championed the lunacy of swallowing hook line and sinker, the self-serving strictures (of the accomplices in crime against Ghanaians and their nation: the agents of the Washington neo-liberal ideologues - led by the ruthless and anti-democratic Dick Cheney, the present US vice president), the World Bank and the IMF, when it was in power, now also apparently intends to follow some of the ideas Nkrumah espoused all those years ago, and used successfully, to build a more humane society (than the present “dog-eat-dog” madness, which is the defining characteristic, of our society today), then there is hope for our nation, yet, perhaps!
Hmmm, Ghana – eyeasem oo: asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
Saturday, 1 November 2008
ARE WE DRIVING THE LAST NAILS INTO THE COFFIN OF GHANAIAN DEMOCRACY?
Quote: "The release referred to Memorandum to Parliament on the Agreement, which obliged the VALCO to enter into a binding and irrevocable Power Purchase Agreement/ Electricity Supply Agreement with the VRA, which should also deliver a certain quantum of power based on certain thresholds in term of tonnes of aluminium for a period of four years. The Memorandum, the release said also referred to the terms of agreement for a consortium to make an initial payment of US$25 million within 15 working days from the execution of agreement and upon approval of the agreement by Parliament."Unquote.
Please click to read full story: (www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/NewsArchive/artikel.php?ID=152441)
Hmmm, Ghana - enti ye awiaye paa enia? Just what kind of a "tom-fool" agreement is this? Do these well-educated imbeciles running our country, never think about Ghana's national interest, at all?
"The outstanding amount of US$150.5 million is to be paid within 45 working days after the VALCO smelter has commenced production with two pot lines in normal operation, the execution of the transfer of shares by the Government, shareholders agreement between the shareholders of the company and the delivery of the share certificate signed by VALCO in favour of the consortium."
Gosh, are some of our leaders so clueless - or is it the case that they simply do not care one jot about foreigners taking us for a huge ride: as long as they get their kickbacks to funnel into the accounts of their special purpose offshore vehicles?
This is just unbelievable - have they forgotten how hard-pressed electricity consumers had to subsidize Kaiser Aluminum for decades, in the socialization-of-private-risk deal they wanted to continue with - long after we had met our side of the bargain that brought them here to begin with? How right Fremaa Busia is about the morality of some of our leaders - some of whom are nothing more than gangsters. Incredible!
So to enrich a few powerful crooks in government, present and future generations of Ghanaians have to allow the Atiwa Mountain range rain forest to be torn down – so that the short-term lunacy, at a time of global climate change, of an integrated aluminum industry, whose final products will never be competitive with that of Alcoa’s new aluminum smelter in Iceland (because it gets thermal power from underground hot springs at practically no cost!) can be rammed down our throats: and railroaded through parliament and undermine our democratic institutions, yet again?
Must we, as a people, be robbed of the value of the billions of dollars of yet-to-be discovered medicinal plants (which can form the basis of a sustainable green industry to benefit our people till the very end of time!) in that important rain forest; run the risk of the sources of the drinking water supply of some of our cities drying up; see a significant part of our nation’s biodiversity disappear, when the Atiwa Mountain range rain forest is torn down - just so that a few high net worth individuals can grow even wealthier still, and all that at the expense of the long-term well-being of our country and its people? Why, do they think we are all fools, or what?
Why must we destroy nature, something that helps give us a good quality of life, just because (taflatse!) a few men and women, uncouth philistines whose greed knows no bounds, and who know the price of everything under the African sun, but the value of absolutely nothing of worth in this life, want to be remembered for what they think is a great legacy?
With respect, we will not permit the rape of the pristine natural environment of one of only two uplands evergreen rain forests Ghana has, to ever go ahead, at a time of global warming. The quality of life that that ensures for our country and its people, will not be sacrificed on the alter of the hidden personal wealth creation agenda, of people whose greed knows no bounds. Period.
What legacy is a project that threatens a valuable resource of nature, a unique and important West African rain forest, crucial to the continued well-being of Ghanaians, and vital for ensuring a good quality of life for all – one lived in harmonious existence with nature, at a time of global climate change: something that is supposed to impact nations like ours in Africa, negatively? Can they tell us what all that would cost if a monetary value was put on it – since they are such good and avid bean-counters?
"Meanwhile, Mr Abraham Ossei Aidooh, Majority Leader has announced that the date for Parliament to rise has been rescheduled from Friday November 7, 2008 to Tuesday November 11, 2008." Typical – they are showing the same ruthless disregard for the constitutional principle of separation of powers, which has been the hallmark of their tenure of office, thus far.
Yet, these hypocrites never cease blowing their own trumpet about their belief in democracy. They are showing their contempt for parliament’s oversight role under our constitution (that flawed document that was specially designed for the convenience of an absolute dictatorship, needing to metamorphose into an elected dictatorship in 1992!), that they have shown throughout their tenure - especially when they want to rip our country off, in collaboration with foreign carpetbaggers.
Well, let me boldly predict to Mr. Abraham Ossei Aidooh, that when the 21st century equivalent of the June 4th 1979 military uprising finally comes along, it will be precisely such tactics, the railroading through parliament of agreements that are inimical to our country's interests (but which personally benefit the few powerful crooks who now dominate the ruling party so completely), that those coming in to “house-clean” for a few months, whiles a new constitution is prepared for truly free and fair elections to take us into a new and genuinely democratic 5th Republic, will cite, as examples, of the very undemocratic nature of this regime.
So Mr. Abraham Ossei Aidooh had better revise his notes and cast his mind back to the Kalabule-period prelude to the events of June 4th 1979 - when the politically well-connected and powerful crooks of the day, also thought they were all-powerful and invincible.
If he recalls, in the end, they all regretted that they were driven by the unfathomable greed that had made them ignore truth and common decency, as they gang-raped mother Ghana with total impunity - much as the crooks in the regime of which he is such a prominent member, are now carrying on.
Let him remember the wise Ghanaian saying: "No condition is permanent" - as he scrapes the bottom of the pork-barrel to bribe his fellow MP's. They are merely driving the final nails into the coffin of Ghanaian democracy – which their complete disregard for the letter and spirit of the constitution, and their sheer bloody-minded arrogance, represents. A word to the wise…
Hmmm, Ghana - enti ye awiaye paa enia? Asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long Ghana!
Please click to read full story: (www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/NewsArchive/artikel.php?ID=152441)
Hmmm, Ghana - enti ye awiaye paa enia? Just what kind of a "tom-fool" agreement is this? Do these well-educated imbeciles running our country, never think about Ghana's national interest, at all?
"The outstanding amount of US$150.5 million is to be paid within 45 working days after the VALCO smelter has commenced production with two pot lines in normal operation, the execution of the transfer of shares by the Government, shareholders agreement between the shareholders of the company and the delivery of the share certificate signed by VALCO in favour of the consortium."
Gosh, are some of our leaders so clueless - or is it the case that they simply do not care one jot about foreigners taking us for a huge ride: as long as they get their kickbacks to funnel into the accounts of their special purpose offshore vehicles?
This is just unbelievable - have they forgotten how hard-pressed electricity consumers had to subsidize Kaiser Aluminum for decades, in the socialization-of-private-risk deal they wanted to continue with - long after we had met our side of the bargain that brought them here to begin with? How right Fremaa Busia is about the morality of some of our leaders - some of whom are nothing more than gangsters. Incredible!
So to enrich a few powerful crooks in government, present and future generations of Ghanaians have to allow the Atiwa Mountain range rain forest to be torn down – so that the short-term lunacy, at a time of global climate change, of an integrated aluminum industry, whose final products will never be competitive with that of Alcoa’s new aluminum smelter in Iceland (because it gets thermal power from underground hot springs at practically no cost!) can be rammed down our throats: and railroaded through parliament and undermine our democratic institutions, yet again?
Must we, as a people, be robbed of the value of the billions of dollars of yet-to-be discovered medicinal plants (which can form the basis of a sustainable green industry to benefit our people till the very end of time!) in that important rain forest; run the risk of the sources of the drinking water supply of some of our cities drying up; see a significant part of our nation’s biodiversity disappear, when the Atiwa Mountain range rain forest is torn down - just so that a few high net worth individuals can grow even wealthier still, and all that at the expense of the long-term well-being of our country and its people? Why, do they think we are all fools, or what?
Why must we destroy nature, something that helps give us a good quality of life, just because (taflatse!) a few men and women, uncouth philistines whose greed knows no bounds, and who know the price of everything under the African sun, but the value of absolutely nothing of worth in this life, want to be remembered for what they think is a great legacy?
With respect, we will not permit the rape of the pristine natural environment of one of only two uplands evergreen rain forests Ghana has, to ever go ahead, at a time of global warming. The quality of life that that ensures for our country and its people, will not be sacrificed on the alter of the hidden personal wealth creation agenda, of people whose greed knows no bounds. Period.
What legacy is a project that threatens a valuable resource of nature, a unique and important West African rain forest, crucial to the continued well-being of Ghanaians, and vital for ensuring a good quality of life for all – one lived in harmonious existence with nature, at a time of global climate change: something that is supposed to impact nations like ours in Africa, negatively? Can they tell us what all that would cost if a monetary value was put on it – since they are such good and avid bean-counters?
"Meanwhile, Mr Abraham Ossei Aidooh, Majority Leader has announced that the date for Parliament to rise has been rescheduled from Friday November 7, 2008 to Tuesday November 11, 2008." Typical – they are showing the same ruthless disregard for the constitutional principle of separation of powers, which has been the hallmark of their tenure of office, thus far.
Yet, these hypocrites never cease blowing their own trumpet about their belief in democracy. They are showing their contempt for parliament’s oversight role under our constitution (that flawed document that was specially designed for the convenience of an absolute dictatorship, needing to metamorphose into an elected dictatorship in 1992!), that they have shown throughout their tenure - especially when they want to rip our country off, in collaboration with foreign carpetbaggers.
Well, let me boldly predict to Mr. Abraham Ossei Aidooh, that when the 21st century equivalent of the June 4th 1979 military uprising finally comes along, it will be precisely such tactics, the railroading through parliament of agreements that are inimical to our country's interests (but which personally benefit the few powerful crooks who now dominate the ruling party so completely), that those coming in to “house-clean” for a few months, whiles a new constitution is prepared for truly free and fair elections to take us into a new and genuinely democratic 5th Republic, will cite, as examples, of the very undemocratic nature of this regime.
So Mr. Abraham Ossei Aidooh had better revise his notes and cast his mind back to the Kalabule-period prelude to the events of June 4th 1979 - when the politically well-connected and powerful crooks of the day, also thought they were all-powerful and invincible.
If he recalls, in the end, they all regretted that they were driven by the unfathomable greed that had made them ignore truth and common decency, as they gang-raped mother Ghana with total impunity - much as the crooks in the regime of which he is such a prominent member, are now carrying on.
Let him remember the wise Ghanaian saying: "No condition is permanent" - as he scrapes the bottom of the pork-barrel to bribe his fellow MP's. They are merely driving the final nails into the coffin of Ghanaian democracy – which their complete disregard for the letter and spirit of the constitution, and their sheer bloody-minded arrogance, represents. A word to the wise…
Hmmm, Ghana - enti ye awiaye paa enia? Asem ebaba debi ankasa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long Ghana!
Re: "Ghana has the hottest exchange in the world"
Yes, Ghana has the world's best performing stock market. That economic equivalent of a "mirage-in-the-desert" and perfect example of "sleight-of-hand" economics, illustrates a point perfectly: The bankruptcy of thought of our country's political class.
They are obsessed with conventional economic thinking - because they are not original thinkers, like Nkrumah was. Against the prevailing Socialist orthodoxy of the time, Nkrumah chose the mixed-economy, private public partnership (PPP) model, long before it became fashionable - with the state actively promoting import substitution projects to provide jobs for ordinary people and improving their quality of life by providing free education, free medical care, and good quality housing at affordable rental rates for those who could not afford to buy their own homes.
Sadly, today's political elite, is totally bereft of original thinking - and is consequently obsessed with GDP growth rates: without ever thinking of what actually constitutes those growth rate figures, and their impact in the real world.
That is what has led to the apparent paradox of a nation with the best-performing stock market (a contradiction in terms, in an illiquid stock exchange, in any case!), but the vast majority of whose ordinary citizens cannot afford the most basic necessities of life.
It has resulted in the intolerable situation and the incredible paradox of a nation experiencing increased GDP growth rates, whiles the quality of life of its citizens plummets steadily, in inverse proportion to the recorded growth of the national economy.
If we moved out of the shadow of conventional economic thinking, and chose to examine what actually constitutes that growth, item by item, we will realise that like growth in all societies that are built on the "selfish-capitalism" model promoted by Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, it is growth that benefits only a powerful few in society. They are too blinkered to see that the so-called "trickle-down" theory, does not work in the real economy.
Today, we have all seen how that selfishness has brought the wealthiest capitalist nations to their knees - and the nation-state, has had to organise "bailouts" at taxpayers' expense, for the private entities that were ran to the ground by the greed of the apostles of “selfish-capitalism” - the high-rolling bankers, sundry hedge fund Titans, ruthless derivatives market sharks, and sub-prime market kings: the ultimate masters of the universe!
Their local lackeys here, who also preached the "selfish-capitalism" mantra, as they sold one state-owned asset, after another (every one of them built with the blood, sweat and tears of ordinary Ghanaians), in shady deal after shady deal, which saw those prime national assets pass into the hands of foreign carpetbaggers for a song - with the crumbs going to their local collaborators and the crooks amongst our leaders: as finders' fees and kickbacks, have simply run out of ideas on providing ordinary people with sustainable economic development: which also gives them a better quality of life.
So, today, after those fat-cats have prospered mightily, even as they impoverished our nation and its people yet further (whiles they boasted constantly to us about macro-economic stability and Ghana's impressive GDP growth rates), they have finally succeeded in bringing our nation to its knees - just like their lord and master George "Dubya" Bush has succeeded in bringing the wealthiest and the most powerful nation on the planet Earth, the United States of America, to its knees.
Yes, we certainly have the world's best-performing stock market - which is also illiquid: and of precious use to serious investors worldwide. Why boast about a stock market with the dollar-equivalent of penny shares that stockholders never part with - and disturb the ears of a people struggling to make sure that they are not finally engulfed by the filth that is steadily choking the very life out of their villages, towns and cities: as they struggle to survive, one day at a time?
Is that sad and brutal "fact-on-the-ground" not rather the real indicator of the unpleasant truth that the quality of life of ordinary Ghanaians has steadily deteriorated - whiles the well-connected powerful few, who have benefited from the record GDP growth rates, prospered mightily in the interim - taking their already high personal net worth into the stratosphere, whiles their greed impoverished a whole nation?
Have the politically well-connected crooks amongst our rulers, as well as the tax-dodging and dishonest regime-crony oligarchs, not been the main beneficiaries of our record GDP growth rate figures, if truth be told?
On top of all that, today, ordinary folk, who have dared criticise the greed and selfishness of our ruling elite, have been cheekily labelled "lazy" and "envious" - having salt rubbed into the wounds inflicted on them by those self-same well-connected and powerful few, whose unfathomable greed and amoral ways, apparently knows no bounds: and is fast-destroying the very fabric of Ghanaian society.
Yes, Ghana certainly has the world's "hottest stock exchange" - but its citizens' quality of life is also definitely one of the worst on the surface of the planet Earth! Hmmm, Ghana - enti yeawiaye paa enia? Ayeasem oo: asem ebaba debi anksa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
They are obsessed with conventional economic thinking - because they are not original thinkers, like Nkrumah was. Against the prevailing Socialist orthodoxy of the time, Nkrumah chose the mixed-economy, private public partnership (PPP) model, long before it became fashionable - with the state actively promoting import substitution projects to provide jobs for ordinary people and improving their quality of life by providing free education, free medical care, and good quality housing at affordable rental rates for those who could not afford to buy their own homes.
Sadly, today's political elite, is totally bereft of original thinking - and is consequently obsessed with GDP growth rates: without ever thinking of what actually constitutes those growth rate figures, and their impact in the real world.
That is what has led to the apparent paradox of a nation with the best-performing stock market (a contradiction in terms, in an illiquid stock exchange, in any case!), but the vast majority of whose ordinary citizens cannot afford the most basic necessities of life.
It has resulted in the intolerable situation and the incredible paradox of a nation experiencing increased GDP growth rates, whiles the quality of life of its citizens plummets steadily, in inverse proportion to the recorded growth of the national economy.
If we moved out of the shadow of conventional economic thinking, and chose to examine what actually constitutes that growth, item by item, we will realise that like growth in all societies that are built on the "selfish-capitalism" model promoted by Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, it is growth that benefits only a powerful few in society. They are too blinkered to see that the so-called "trickle-down" theory, does not work in the real economy.
Today, we have all seen how that selfishness has brought the wealthiest capitalist nations to their knees - and the nation-state, has had to organise "bailouts" at taxpayers' expense, for the private entities that were ran to the ground by the greed of the apostles of “selfish-capitalism” - the high-rolling bankers, sundry hedge fund Titans, ruthless derivatives market sharks, and sub-prime market kings: the ultimate masters of the universe!
Their local lackeys here, who also preached the "selfish-capitalism" mantra, as they sold one state-owned asset, after another (every one of them built with the blood, sweat and tears of ordinary Ghanaians), in shady deal after shady deal, which saw those prime national assets pass into the hands of foreign carpetbaggers for a song - with the crumbs going to their local collaborators and the crooks amongst our leaders: as finders' fees and kickbacks, have simply run out of ideas on providing ordinary people with sustainable economic development: which also gives them a better quality of life.
So, today, after those fat-cats have prospered mightily, even as they impoverished our nation and its people yet further (whiles they boasted constantly to us about macro-economic stability and Ghana's impressive GDP growth rates), they have finally succeeded in bringing our nation to its knees - just like their lord and master George "Dubya" Bush has succeeded in bringing the wealthiest and the most powerful nation on the planet Earth, the United States of America, to its knees.
Yes, we certainly have the world's best-performing stock market - which is also illiquid: and of precious use to serious investors worldwide. Why boast about a stock market with the dollar-equivalent of penny shares that stockholders never part with - and disturb the ears of a people struggling to make sure that they are not finally engulfed by the filth that is steadily choking the very life out of their villages, towns and cities: as they struggle to survive, one day at a time?
Is that sad and brutal "fact-on-the-ground" not rather the real indicator of the unpleasant truth that the quality of life of ordinary Ghanaians has steadily deteriorated - whiles the well-connected powerful few, who have benefited from the record GDP growth rates, prospered mightily in the interim - taking their already high personal net worth into the stratosphere, whiles their greed impoverished a whole nation?
Have the politically well-connected crooks amongst our rulers, as well as the tax-dodging and dishonest regime-crony oligarchs, not been the main beneficiaries of our record GDP growth rate figures, if truth be told?
On top of all that, today, ordinary folk, who have dared criticise the greed and selfishness of our ruling elite, have been cheekily labelled "lazy" and "envious" - having salt rubbed into the wounds inflicted on them by those self-same well-connected and powerful few, whose unfathomable greed and amoral ways, apparently knows no bounds: and is fast-destroying the very fabric of Ghanaian society.
Yes, Ghana certainly has the world's "hottest stock exchange" - but its citizens' quality of life is also definitely one of the worst on the surface of the planet Earth! Hmmm, Ghana - enti yeawiaye paa enia? Ayeasem oo: asem ebaba debi anksa! May God bless and protect our homeland Ghana, always. Long live freedom! Long live Ghana!
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