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

Just as I was beginning to recover from the blinding biff that many of us concerned Ghanaian citizens, both at home and abroad, sustained from the latest presidential looting package (a.k.a. gratuity), I came across an article captioned “NDC Guru Slaps Driver” (Modernghana.com 1/24/09). The article recounted the savage slapping of her chauffeur by a Ms. Anita Jemima De-Souza, allegedly, a deputy propaganda secretary of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC), primarily because after Ms. De-Souza returned from a talk-show hosted on Kessben Fm radio, in Kumasi, the chauffeur was not waiting obsequiously, in the station’s parking lot, like a proverbial lap-dog eager to do the bidding of his mistress.

In principle, while one may aptly agree with Ms. De-Souza that having to wait in the Aseda House parking lot with her chauffeur nowhere in sight might have posed a personal security risk of some sort, at least theoretically speaking, had the NDC’s deputy Squealer (apologies to George Orwell) been savvy enough about her need for security detail, she could have employed the services of one as such. Or better yet, she could have had her driver double up as her security guard and had him escort her to the studious of Kessben Fm. In sum, the fact that Ms. De-Souza had no security or body guard with her at the time of the incident, clearly indicates the fact of her safety not being at risk at all. Else, the obvious conclusion that any well-meaning person reaches is that Ms. De-Souza is, after all, not quite as intelligent as her functional designation suggests.

The preceding notwithstanding, it appears that Ms. De-Souza’s chauffeur was no dumb idler, after all. For we learn that he was about the germane business of taking proper account of transactions undertaken with his mistress early that morning, prior to his boss’ talk-show rendezvous. Whatever the case may be, slapping her adult-male driver in public, or even in private, was not only utterly distasteful, it was also criminally punishable under the laws of the land, as it were.

As for Ms. Squealer’s subterfuge that her unnamed driver was her adopted son and that the mere fact of such novercal relationship legitimized her brutal abuse, we couldn’t disagree more vehemently. If anything at all, Ghanaian step- or adopted mothers are notorious for the gross maltreatment of their wards, and this is all the more reason why a prominent political figure like Ms. De-Souza ought to have demonstrated her moral enlightenment on this score. Unfortunately, what the top NDC functionary has achieved by such cringingly crude and unenlightened, as well as patently criminal, behavior is to set a bad public precedent. Now many an ordinary Ghanaian citizen brought up on a grievous charge of abuse, would be apt in citing the egregious case of the deputy NDC propaganda secretary in perfect justification for such wrongdoing.

Such abject behavior, while perfectly in synch with mainstream NDC modus operandi, ironically comes at a time when Ghanaians are being widely and extensively educated about the need to shun physical, verbal and emotional abuse of any form. Culturally speaking, such public abuse of a Ghanaian male by a female, regardless of the sociopolitical status of the latter, is not taken kindly to; and, in fact, traditionally, it is biological, or birth, mothers who have been quick to counsel their sons against taking any physical, or even emotional, abuse from the women in their lives. Thus, as a purportedly adopted mother to her chauffeur son, the last thing that anybody ought to have expected of Ms. De-Souza, was to have publicly witnessed her so brutally assault the very young man that she had, reportedly, committed herself to protecting.

Unless she was being illegally chauffeured, it appears that the unnamed young man whom Ms. De-Souza, allegedly, savagely assaulted must have been at least 18 years old, and thus an adult old enough to undertake a legally sanctioned conjugal contract.

In any case, in this auspicious age of cell-phone culture, at least a handful of the teeming bystanders who witnessed Ms. De-Souza brutally assault her chauffeur ought to have promptly alerted the police. A concerned citizen could also have personally filed a complaint against the NDC deputy propaganda secretary and have her prosecuted, with or without the express consent of the victim, provided that enough evidence had been promptly collected, such as verifiable and traceable eye-witness accounts and hospital records, assuming that the victim had been willing to be medically treated.

Of course, we are also mindful of the fact that cynical politicians like Ms. Anita Jemima De-Souza take the NDC’s return to power to constitute an open season for the rampant and riotous abuse of people they perceive to be standing in their way. We are hopeful that the proverbial day-of-reckoning may not be far off for the criminally abusive likes of Ms. De-Souza.

*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 the author of 18 books, including “Ghanaian Politics Today” (Atumpan Publications/lulu.com, 2008). E-mail: okoampaahoofe@aol.com. ###