** Part One

Part One: ** What Exactly Did Kwesi Say*
*
*
*Feature Article* | *by Nana Akyea Mensah, The Odikro.*

*Twitter: /twitter.com/TheOdikro,**

*

*Introduction.*

I wish to raise the following: US Military Bases In Ghana: Any Secret Deal
Between The NPP And The Americans? Gabriel Asare Ochere-Darko, Executive
Director of the Danquah Institute, Says So! This also includes, quite
naturally, a special treatment of the NPP-USA.

The latest twaddle of the NPP USA concerns three main issues:

1. The link between our oil and the US Military Bases in Africa
2. The GNPC-KOSMOS Dispute Over Violations Of the Laws Of Ghana.
3. Socialism and Capitalism

These are not subjects that one can treat exhaustively under one article
unless one is full of wine, or beer, as it might be in the case of the
scribes of the NPP USA. I am thus compelled to take them one after the other
in subsequent feature articles. This permits me to deal effectively and
fairly comprehensively with every important aspect of this very important
national conversation.

Thus for now, our focus is on the first point:
The link between Africa's Oil and the US Africom: What Does The NPP Say
About This?*


What Exactly Did Kwesi Say About This Link?
* A lot of people have heard of the strange and monumentally ignominious
call by the USA-NPP for the arrest of Kwesi Pratt, Jnr. Whilst this marks a
very extremely low point for our precious infant democracy. It is obvious
from their press releases that the NPP USA are very adamant not to bite the
finger that feeds them. This however should not prevent us to defend our own
country, Ghana. What many people are unaware of is the question of what did
Kwesi say exactly whilst contributing to a panel discussion on *Radio Gold*’s
*Alhaji and
Alhaji*political
programme, to incur the wrath of this group who now accuse Mr.
Pratt for causing needless "fear and panic" in their hearts and are
therefore calling for his arrest?

It is amazing the speed with which they are seeking refuge behind
meaningless ideological debates instead of discussing real and present
dangers facing our continent today, which could be worse than slavery and
colonialism combined!* *It is the exposure of the NPP's involvement once
again in a brutal mischief against the people of Ghana and Africa which is
the source of the fear and the panic they are complaining of! By the time I
am through with this article, I would have given enough hints to alert
Ghanaians as to why they should be extremely careful about every single move
of the dubious clique of treacherous elites and traitors of their own people
who dare to call themselves "patriotic"!*

"USA Is Ready To Kill And Destroy For Ghana's Oil... NPP Is Supporting
Them!" *

A Transcription of the Statement by Mr. Kwesi Pratt, Jnr., by the courtesy
of the Office of the
Odikro.

*BEGIN QUOTE*

The Ghana National Petroleum Corporation has said that it is interested in
buying the 23 per cent stake of Kosmos in the Jubilee Field. It is not, as
it were, extracting that stake from Kosmos. Kosmos itself says, "We want
out, we want to sell."

The Ghana National Petroleum Corporation says, "We want to buy it."

Kosmos says, "We will not sell to Ghana. We will only sell it to another
American company."

The whole of the US establishment is mounting monumental pressure on our
government to cave in to US demands. Christian Council is quiet, Bar
Association is quiet. New Patriotic Party is supporting Kosmos against
Ghana. I mean, this is incredible! You cannot believe it my brother, it's
incredible!

Kosmos has violated the laws of Ghana with impunity. They have made data,
that we have paid more than 300 million dollars collecting - the GNPC
expenditure on collecting seismic data and so on, cost the Ghanaian tax
payer, more than 300 million dollars - Kosmos takes the data and distributes
it free of charge in order to promote its interests, in order to ensure that
it gets more money for its shares.

This matter is raised, and the very people who are making noises about our
oil revenue, K.T. Hammond, New Patriotic Party, all these
World-Bank-and-IMF-funded so-called NGOs! They are supporting Kosmos in
this, against the people of Ghana. And they are the same people making
noises about oil revenue. I mean, it is incredible!

I don't know how many people have read "The Cheney Report", the Cheney
Report on America's strategic interests in West African Oil? I don't know
how many people have read it. Now, if you have read the Cheney Report...,
you know, when George Bush became President in 2001, one of his first acts
was to establish a committee which would determine the US strategic energy
interests and so on.

That committee was chaired by Dick Cheney, his Vice President, and they've
written a very interesting Report. The Report says that, given all the
turmoil, the social, political and economic turmoil in the Middle East and
the Persian Gulf and other places, The Report said at the time that the US
was importing around 11 per cent of its total oil requirements from West
Africa. Eleven to twenty five per cent in ten years!

So let us open our eyes. Let us listen to the world - what is happening what
is happening in the world! The major threat to us is the conspiracy by some
of the Western powers, especially the United States of America, to control
our oil resources. And don't you make a mistake, military bases are not
established for picnics! Military bases are established for the purposes of
killing and destruction, and not for organising picnics!

So what the US is saying is that they are ready to kill, to maim, and
destroy, in order to control our oil resources. And our churches, our Bar
Association, and the so-called elders in society are quibbling about whether
we should put our money in the bank or spend it! They are not thinking about
how to control the resource. The are thinking about what to do with the
crumbs which fall from the table of the big powers. That is what they are
thinking about!

I think that the first and most important thing that any citizen of Ghana
who loves his country has to do is to ensure that the oil belongs to us, and
we control it, and we exploit and utilize it on behalf of our people,
especially the disadvantaged.

*END QUOTE. *


*De-linking Oil From US Military Bases In Africa*
"What makes this claim infantile is that in reality, Ghana’s proven oil
reserves of 1.8 billion barrels, while contextually significant and greatly
appreciated, constitute 0.17% of proven oil reserves on the African
continent. Pratt would have us believe that the United States would spend
$10 billion (the minimum spent on even the smallest of military bases) for
that amount of oil? It is true that the United States does not build
military bases for charity purposes, and that it does so to protect its
interest. That said, a cost/benefit analysis does not support the puerile
claims made by this third rate debater. What’s more, plans to establish a
United States Military base in Ghana surfaced at least four years before the
oil discovery, and it had more to do with the war on terrorism."
"The USA branch of the NPP does not deny that the United States of America
intended or wished to establish a military base in Ghana. It stated inter
alia that “….plans to establish a United States military base in the country
surfaced at least four years before the oil discovery and that it has more
to do with the war on terrorism than the control of oil resources in Ghana”.
Clearly what this branch of the NPP seeks to do is to admit the intent to
establish a US military base in Ghana but to delink it from the control of
the country's oil. Unfortunately, the United States itself coupled its
intention to establish a military base in Ghana with its control of the oil
resources of West Africa.
When President George W. Bush became the President of the United States of
America in 2001, he set up what has come to be known as the Cheney
Committee, chaired by his Vice President good old Dick Cheney with a mandate
to review US strategic energy requirements. The report of the Cheney
Committee predicted that US oil imports from West Africa will rise from 11
per cent in 2001 to 25 per cent in 2015 as a result of several factors. The
report recommended that as a measure to protect US interest in West African
oil, military bases needed to established in West Africa. Following this
recommendation the late president of Nigeria, Omaru Yardua stated that
Nigeria will not allow the establishment of foreign military bases on its
soil and will use all of her influence to prevent the establishment of US
military bases in West Africa. See: NPP - USA: Attack dogs of Imperialism
And Ignorant Noise
Makers!
Other people, including scholars in the US Military are saying the same
thing:

"In May 2001 the Cheney report warned that the U.S. would grow increasingly
dependent upon foreign oil in the years to come and recommended that as a
matter of policy the Bush Administration work to increase production and
export of oil from regions other than the Middle East, noting that Latin
America and West Africa were likely to be the fasting growing sources of
future U.S. oil
imports.[48]
Africa supplies about 15% of U.S. oil imports, but with African production
growing at twice the global rate, it could be supplying the U.S. with as
much energy as the Middle East within a
decade.[49]
Three months later, Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Walter
Kansteiner declared that African oil "has become a national strategic
interest.[50]
" This statement is particularly noteworthy in that it uses the language of
the Carter Doctrine in the Middle East, in which President Carter went on to
declare that the U.S. would intervene by any means necessary to protect its
national interest in Middle Eastern oil. In April 2002, Donald Norland,
former U.S. Ambassador to Chad told a Congressional subcommittee: "It's been
reliably reported that, for the first time, the two concepts—'Africa' and
'U.S. national security'—have been used in the same sentence in Pentagon
documents."[51]
Having declared African oil to be of strategic interest to the United
States, the Bush Administration has not taken the second step to actually
apply the Carter Doctrine to Africa. This has left U.S. policy open to
criticism from both sides. The Council on Foreign Relations Task Force on
U.S. policy in Africa has criticized it for failing "to make a geopolitical
shift to pay sufficient attention to West Africa's energy rich Gulf of
Guinea,"[52]
while others see a neo-imperial push unfolding in the
sub-region.[53]
" - Letitia Lawson, U.S. Africa Policy Since the Cold
War,Strategic
Insights, Volume VI, Issue 1 (January 2007)
* US Naval Postgraduate School*.

When Kwesi Pratt Jnr., first broke the news in 2007 of the US intentions to
establish its Africom headquarters in Accra with the connivance of the
ruling NPP, my first reaction was "how are they going to pull that off? We
were virtually in an electoral year and an overwhelming majority of
Ghanaians would not approve of a party that brings in a foreign power to
establish a military base on our territory!" Reading later on from an
article written by Mr. Akufo-Addo's right-hand man, Gabby Asare
Ochere-Darko, the Executive Director of the Danquah Institute, all the
denials and assurances given by Presidents Kufour and Bush in Accra during
the latter's visit was nothing but the "Baloney!" itself!*
*
Indeed, I suspected it as it was happening, that the NPP, particularly Nana
Akufo-Addo must have prevailed with George Bush to defer public
manifestation until after the elections, since the NPP was bound to lose the
elections if this issue came up before the December 2008 elections.
Ochere-Darko's article, "Obama's Visit, What Is In It For Us And The
US?
*" *confirmed my worst of fears! Both our own President, Mr. John Agyekum
Kufour and Mr. George Bush lied publicly to the people of Ghana and the
world at large, when Mr Bush declared to the media that the US was not
interested in establishing military bases in Ghana. They were both aware
that they were deceiving the public. Needless to say, that these lies must
have been carefully discussed and rehearsed! In the next part we shall
discuss a very closely related subject: *"Bush And Kufour Working In Secret
And Throwing Dust Into Our Eyes!" after the famous **"Baloney!"
Declaration. *Please don't miss it! Give me a follow on twitter and I shall
show you where I am coming from!

Forward Ever! Backwards Never!!!

The Odikro, Nana Akyea Mensah II,
E-Mail: nanaakyeamensah@gmail.com
Twitter: /twitter.com/TheOdikro,
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