Opinions of Thursday, 5 May 2016

Columnist: Point Of Law

Baako begs the question

Unlike Abdul Malik Kweku Baako Jnr who is not sure if Paul Afoko will consider him (Baako) a friend due to his huge respect for him in the past, I still like Mr. Baako for his claim of discharging his burden of proof.

Although I have sometime decided not to patronize Kokrokoo for lack of balance content and panelist, I made time to listen to the embarrassing response Mr Baako was going to give to Paul Afoko on the challenge he invited him to. While the Wednesday panel continued in their usual boring, uninspiring and skewed analogy, I still stayed glued to my radio set because I have heard the host Sefa-Kayi announced among his topics ‘Afoko dares Baako’.

But to my dismay, Kweku began playing a victim of venom and assault on him by people he (Baako) describes as loyalists of Afoko rather than proving his claim that Afoko knew about the presence of the SERBIAN TRAINERS in the country, a claim Mr Afoko has disputed.

Hypocritically, Kweku, who thinks he should be allowed some space to state his position against Mr Afoko when it comes to politics, is vehemently opposed to a person who reacts to him on his position against Afoko.

Staying in my track, Adbul Malik is yet to provide evidence that suggest Paul Afoko as a national chairman of the New Patriotic Party was had a fore knowledge of the importation of the Serbian Trainers. On page 40 of AfricaWatch Magazine, Paul Afoko was asked ‘So the government’s statement that the NPP brought some Serbian nationals into the country in 2014 to train selected people drawn from across the country in the art of civil insurrection, dubbed “Assaulting the Pillars of Power,” is true? In his response he said 'the NPP as a group did not bring any Serbians into the country. ‘When I called a Steering Committee meeting on this issue’, ‘I was told that Ken Ofori-Atta, a cousin of the presidential candidate, paid the four Serbians and brought them into the country to train our party people’. ‘As the chairman of the NPP, I wasn’t aware of it and the Steering Committee also had no knowledge of it’. ‘ He insisted that when people who are related to the presidential candidate or people who are close to him, do their own things without authorization from the NPP leadership, it is unfair to blame the party. And people should stop associating the party with these crazy things by the intolerant militant wing’.

I won’t blame Mr. Baako because he said elsewhere that he does not glorify AfricaWatch but his Crusading Guide. I thought Mr. Baako has a standing Order not to attack the works of another Journalist?

The Crusading Guide managing editor told his Wednesday Kokrokoo listeners that before Afoko went to address the Serbian Training College, Freddy Blay, and the First vice National Chairman had inaugurated the training programme. The question, therefore, is how Afoko could have fore-knowledge of the program but wouldn’t know when it was inaugurated according to Mr. Baako?

How can Kweku conclude that, because Afoko told AfricaWatch that he, Paul Afoko, as chairman of the NPP, would never allow them to take the party on that crazy route in the presence of the two Serbians, and admonished his party people and asked them to leave the hotel immediately and go home amount to lies?

In any case, the ‘I HAVE THE DOCUMENT’ journalist is yet to salvage his dented image. As for credibility I am still looking around if he still has some left, because almighty Kweku Baako was unable to provide a strip of evidence to substantiate his claim, let alone attempt answering the SIX BULLET POINTS QUESTIONS from the office of the man he cherished so much to destroy.

All if not most of last Wednesday listeners of KOKROKOO were left wondering as Baako danced naked to the applause of his apple-polishing and acquisitive colleague in the name of journalism.

Uncle Baako, what has occasioned your hatred for a man you describes your good friend in the past? I want to know. Tell me why you failed to listen to your good friend before you began your mission to wane his hard earn reputation? Is that how good friends behave?

It is obvious Afoko as Chairman of NPP could not satisfy your needs and wants like your street agitator friend would do as President of Ghana. I would have done same if I were you, however with utmost diligence and care so you don’t hurt your relations with another only to enrich your pocket.

I don’t Know Mr. Afoko that much, but one thing I do know is that he is very honest when it comes to his politics because that is where I know him.

Kweku, there is no further challenge than put up or forever hold your head in shame!