By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

I have read both news reports and listened to a radio (actuality) clip of the rather predictably lame explanation given by the Greater-Accra regional chairman of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) for the savage beating of Ms. Ursula Owusu, and can only wonder whether Mr. Joseph Ade Coker has not vacated his cognitive faculties (See “Ursula Was Beaten for Walking Around Odododiodoo in a Mocking Manner” PeacefmOnline.com 4/15/12). Then again, maybe Mr. Ade Coker never possessed any rational faculties, to begin with.
First of all, it constitutes an epic absurdity for the Greater-Accra NDC chairman to question why the assault victim, who is also the New Patriotic Party’s parliamentary candidate for Ablekuma-South Constituency for Election 2012, had chosen to cross constituency lines, from Ablekuma-South into Odododiodioo, while the biometric registration of eligible voters for Election 2012 was in full swing all over the metropolis, and the country at large.
Secondly, what is even more rankling is for Mr. Ade Coker to imperiously suggest that since the substantive NDC Member of Parliament for Odododiodioo Constituency had not even begun campaigning for reelection, therefore, it was totally out of place for Ms. Owusu to be politicking outside her own electoral and residential area.
I would be damned if I fail to promptly point out to the NDC Greater-Accra chairman that his is the obscene and lurid language of an urban drug kingpin. For who told Mr. Ade Coker that any portion of the geopolitical landscape of Ghana belongs to any particular individual? And then, also, precisely where in Ghana’s 1992 Fourth-Republican Constitution is it categorically stated that any citizen and/or politician needs the permission of another politician in order to promote the ideals and agenda of his/her party or political organization?
Indeed, we are reliably informed that on the day that she was allegedly, savagely assaulted by neighborhood thugs recruited by Mr. Ade Coker and his comrades, Ms. Owusu “had visited [the Odododiodioo Constituency] to encourage traders in the central business district [of Accra] to partake in the ongoing biometric [registration] exercise.” Now, somebody tell me: Is there any constitutional stipulation or edict prohibiting any bona fide Ghanaian citizen and/or partisan political operative from conscientizing the people by apprising them of their inalienable right to the franchise?
In short, it clearly appears that in the blighted imagination of Mr. Ade Coker, Ms. Ursula Owusu had not conducted herself “like a woman” when the latter decided to cross into the NDC stronghold, notorious for rampant incitement of violence against members of the main opposition New Patriotic Party, and presumed to educate her fellow women on the moral and political significance of their right to registering to vote in Election 2012. And just how is any Ghanaian woman expected to behave, if one may aptly ask of Mr. Ade Coker?
Then also, the Greater-Accra NDC party boss fatuously wades into the jaded territory of stereotypical ethnic jokes by bizarrely claiming that “Ursula Owusu walked teasingly with a macho man right in the face of the people[,] thus provoking them.” Is it not incontrovertibly clear from her savage beating that Ms. Owusu needed precisely the protection of at least ten “macho men” in order to successfully hold off these hired NDC thugs, in order to be able to freely and fearlessly exercise her civil right of being able to canvass for votes for both her party and the NPP parliamentary candidate for the Odododiodioo Constituency, even in spite of the fact that the latter was not officially on the campaign trail?
And while it is not very clear to me precisely how “teasing” or “mocking” the mere gait of Ms. Owusu could have precipitated her savage beating by hired NDC punks, it is quite clear to me that listening to Mr. Ade Coker viciously slaughter and mangle the Twi/Akan language with his gruff Yoruba-laced Ga accent, I could equally legitimately order a squad of NPP goons from Kokomlemle to give the NDC Greater-Accra chairman a sound drubbing in order to teach Chief “Ademola” Coker how to speak “good” Twi, the next time he finds himself compelled to take to the airwaves in order to smugly defend the criminal assault of any of his political opponents.
Mr. Ade Coker also rather self-righteously claims that “I am reliably informed that Ursula Owusu denigrated Gas by saying that they have sold all their lands and houses, and so they have no standing in Odododiodioo Constituency.” Well, hasn’t the Greater-Accra NDC chairman himself ever made any derogatory ethnic jokes about any other Ghanaian ethnic group, or even heard some of his own relatives, friends and associates make similar jokes? Indeed, I would be flabbergasted, though not altogether surprised, if Mr. Ade Coker, a patently sexist, morally retarded and rabidly hypocritical NDC hack responded in the negative.
Interestingly, rather than call for the immediate apprehension and rigorous prosecution of those NDC-hired hoodlums who cowardly assaulted Ms. Owusu, Mr. Ade Coker prefers to glibly and vacuously talk about “regrets” and “an examination of the facts and circumstances surrounding the case.” Well, cynical NDC hacks like Messrs. Ade Coker, Atta-Mills and Dramani Mahama had better be warned that “Decision 2012” cannot be won on the basis of intimidation and raw savagery. For, needless to say, violence is the language of desperate losers.

*Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D., is Associate Professor of English, Journalism and Creative Writing at Nassau Community College of the State University of New York, Garden City. He is Director of The Sintim-Aboagye Center for Politics and Culture and author of “Danquah v. Nkrumah: In the Words of Mahoney.” E-mail: okoampaahoofe@optimum.net.
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