General News of Wednesday, 12 October 2011

Source: The Statesman

FONKAR says Nketsiah has rabbies

FONKAR replies Asiedu Nketsiah on “Rawlings is a barking dog”

Members of the Friends of Nana Konadu Agyeman Rawlings have reacted angrily to the description of former President Rawlings and founder of the ruling National Democratic Congress as “a barking dog” by Johnson Asiedu Nketiah, General Secretary of the NDC. Speaking Saturday during the home-coming ceremony of Dr Obed Asamoah and his Democratic Freedom Party into the fold of the NDC,

Mr Nketiah, in apparent allusion to Mr Rawlings, assured the former Chairman of the party that the issues and personalities that chased him away from the party had themselves been eliminated.

“Now the barking dog whose actions forced you out of the NDC no longer exists, so I would have been surprised if you had continued to stay outside…” Asiedu-Nketiah said.

Reacting rather angrily to the comment, Ernest Owusu-Bempah, Director of Operations of FONKAR yesterday told the New Statesman the NDC’s General Secretary “is rather a dog infested with rabbis”, adding “that is why he knows somebody who is a dog and that is also why the bigger dog is barking at him.”

Many political commentators have described the return of the DFP to the NDC as part of the grand scheme to get the |Rawlingses out of the NDC.

Now the legitimacy of Mr Rawlings as the founder of the NDC is even being challenged, with Dr Asamoah insisting that the former President is not part of the founders of the party.

Dr Asamoah, Life Patron of the DFP, officially rejoined the ruling National Democratic Congress after breaking away from the party in 2006 and supporting the NPP in the 2008 elections, stated that the NDC was founded by representatives from various districts and not by ex-president Rawlings.

According to Dr Asamoah, former president Rawlings appropriated a provision in the party’s constitution to state that the NDC was founded on his ideals and thus is the founder of the party.

The assertion of Dr Asamoah has, however, been dismissed by Kofi Adams, deputy General Secretary of the NDC and Spokesperson for the former first couple.

According to Mr Adams, it will be flawed for anyone to suggest that ex-president Rawlings, who chaired the Provisional National Defense Council, and is duly recognised by the party’s constitution as a founding father, to be stripped of that title.

Mr Adams, who was speaking on a number of radio stations, cautioned Dr Asamoah to be mindful of his utterances and avoid churning out flawed information to the public since the NDC is yet to meet and decide on whether to accept his DFP or otherwise.

“The founder of the NDC is President Rawlings because the NDC was formed to continue the ideals and principles of theJune 4 and also the 31st December revolution. ..Dr Obed Asamoah was a secretary in the PNDC and was one of the persons that of course as member of the PNDC had to be sent round to help put this dream together. So Obed is just trying to play smart and talk technicality when we have the real issues on the ground,” Adams noted on Citi FM