General News of Thursday, 22 August 2013

Source: Joy Online

The conspiracy theory behind 29th August ruling

On 29th August 2013, nine judges will give their individual decision on an election petition which is challenging the declaration of John Mahama as winner of 2012 presidential polls.

The Petition is brought by three key figures in the opposition NPP who believe last December's presidential election was flawed massively and so they are pleading the court to overturn the declaration in favour of their candidate Nana Akufo-Addo.

Conspiracy theories are what they are - theories until one gets it right. And as the nation waits for a crucial ruling on August 29th 2013 to determine who really won the 2012 presidential polls, there is little to do than to check the language behind numbers and – conspire.

The President, John Mahama, his vice Kwesi Bekoe Amissah-Arthur and their main challenger Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo in the 2012 presidential elections, were born on the 29th day of the month of their birth.

Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo was born on March 29th 1944, Kwesi Bekoe Amissah-Arthur,the Vice President, was born April 29, 1951 while President John Dramani Mahama was born on November 29, 1958.

And since Ghana’s known date for choosing a president every four years, December 7th is becoming August 29th as far as the election petition is concerned, you could read meaning into this fact too.

The first election ever won by parties of a liberal democratic tradition was held on 29 August 1969. It was won by the Progress Party, the party that gave birth to the New Patriotic Party.

At this stage, nobody is claiming to have read the nine decisions by the nine member panel of justices. It is sacred. But everybody can read the ‘ruling’ of numbers; that is free.