By; Amponsah Stonash

God bless the proponents of democracy! For it has come to stay in our homeland, Ghana. However, the prevailing democratic dispensation does not call for irresponsible and gutter journalistic display. Neither does it call for reckless write-ups with baseless commentaries obviously calculated to distort the facts in the eyes of the unsuspecting Ghanaians.

The above statement was culled from a much earlier article I wrote; “NDC’s Reckless Pessimism at Play.” This was published on Ghana news blocs on October, 2012. This very article was in response to a featherbrained rejoinder released by NDC–USA as a counter-reaction to a well thought-through article “NPP–USA Slams John Mahama” released by NPP–USA Publicity Committee to critically and analytically respond to certain comments made by John Mahama in respect of Nana Addo’s proposed free SHS policy, in the heat of the 2012 elections.

Just last week, two rejoinders were released by NDC-USA in responds to an earlier article “The Supreme Court Has Moral Responsibility to Save” published by NPP-USA, Public Relations Committee. In these rejoinders, one struggles to make meaning out of it. The head and tail of it were lost. They were just some jumble of run on sentences and infantile logic, masquerading as rejoinders. In another breath, the NPP-UK issued out a press statement on the current political situation in our country, and the next day – ‘baam’ – there comes another load of codswallop rejoinder that failed to address the critical concerns raised in the statement.

These rejoinders – which apparently are red rags to a bull – contain nothing but an old chestnuts, and full of invectives. They are mostly penned to malign the personality and image of Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, a colossus primed for the pantheons of our greats!

I must say, we are not impressed to glorify and dignify such litters of rejoinders with a respond, had it not been the fact that NDC-USA has taken pleasure in abusing Ghanaweb, Modernghana etc and its good readers with their damp squib rejoinders that lack merit. These incessant and infantile write-ups do not only expose their bankruptcy in ideas, but also unveil their shallow and narrow mindedness on issues of critical concern in our country.

It clearly projects them as people bereft of genuine ideas, but who can only feed into the written wisdom of their political opponents to rant on the internet. A deep dive in their state of mind clearly reveals that, it is with these tawdry of rejoinders that they hoodwink their paymasters into believing that they are forces to reckon with in the political space. How pity! But, that is what is expected when people begin to fight for attention and ‘identity’ in politics.

Can’t NDC-USA write their story, rather than always issuing out a rejoinder? An avid reader of Ghanaweb quizzed, rhetorically.

As the trailblazers of Ghana’s democracy, we are in no way against the issuance of rejoinder! We will continue to release insightful and thought-provoking statements that will expose the ills in our society, while we wait for the court to make things right. In this regard, we appreciate NDC-USA’s penchant to reacting to our thoughts and ideas that we put across on the internet. At least, it is an indication that, we are setting the agenda for the day – politically. However, we demand intellectual and inspiring rejoinders; those that counteract with cogent analysis to prove it worth.

Ghanaians deserve better.

Those who rely on the internet as their source of information want to be informed, but not to be misinformed and bamboozled. On this note, I will entreat NDC –USA that, if they do not have anything better to write about but will depend on incongruous and groundless rejoinders to announce their presence to the reading public, then they better shut up!

Amponsah Stonash

NPP Communications Directorate

New York