Atta-mills is a classical epitome of a typical biblical Pharisee who went about asking for medical records of the late Nigerian president, Umaru Musa Ya’ardua,at a time he(Atta-Mills),was and still is, having a battle of his life with a debilitating throat cancer which is currently ravaging his vocal-cords, eye-sight and brain cells.

Effects of “metastasis”

If cancer cells metastasize, they spread to other parts of the body and cause tumors (a mass of cells) to grow there. So, metastasis is said to have taken place when an aggressively malignant cancerous cells spread to all the vital organs of the body. This is what seems to be happening to the president. This has affected his eye-sight, vocal-cords and brain-cells, resulting in partial blindness, coarse voice and delusions, respectively. If this cancerous cells currently tearing Atta-Mills’ whole body apart is not checked, it will end up spreading to all other vital organs of his body.

When “metastasis” takes place in the body of cancer sufferers, the end result have always been terminal. I am a medical radiology professional and I am only sharing my professional knowledge in such matters with the public who may not be well apprised in what confronts us a nation, in the unlikely event of the demise of a sitting president.

Epilation (loss of hair)

I have also heard these NDC apologists making obvious illiterate pronouncements that cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy do lose their hair and since Atta-Mills is not losing his hair, he could not be having any cancer treatment. Losing of hair during cancer treatment is what is termed in medical jargon as "epilation".

This occurs depending on the intensity of chemotherapy being administered. A case is point is the Libyan who was charged with the bombing of the Panam flight over the Scottish town of lockerbie.This man has been on cancer treatment for over a decade now but has not lost his hair. So Atta-Mills not losing his hair does not necessarily mean he is not being treated for cancer.

Now, should the president drop dead whiles in office, enormous resources will be expended on all sorts of state events and other constitutional re-engineering since our constitu tion is not very clear as to what must be done in such situation?

Atta-Mills deliberately decided to lie to the good people of Ghana by hiding his illness away from us, in 2008; information the constitution clearly mandates him to have done!!

“We all have hospital cards” debacle President Atta-Mills was once asked about his health and he impertinently retorted by saying “everybody has a hospital card”. Here, I would like him to also appreciate the fact that all inmates of Pantang, Asylum and Ankaful mental facilities, have hospital cards but none of these inmates can aspire to the office of the president, under the laws of our nation as enshrined in our constitution.

For example, X and Y are aspiring to contest for the presidency of Ghana. And let’s say`, it is mandatory for them to be medically examined before being given the green light. Now, if after the medical examination, it is found out that X has malaria parasites in his blood stream but Y has a mental disorder, Y will be disqualified under the constitution while X will be treated for malaria and allowed to go ahead and contest. Here, both X and Y would have visited a health facility and be having hospital cards alright, but the constitution will bar Y from the contest due to mental derangement. The good people of this nation, therefore, reserve the right to demand for evidence of true mental state of any person seeking to, or have already, become our leader. This is because, we all have hospital cards but the levels of our mental steadiness certainly differ!!

Sinus and sinusitis

I can also say it here, on authority, that there is no medical condition called “sinus” as the president and his squadron of shameless apologists are shouting about all over the place.

Sinuses are simply air-spaces located in the frontal area of the skull. They are filled with air and their main function in humans is to give resonance to our voices and make them more audible.Now, the condition called sinuses occurs when the linings of these cavities are infected.

Such conditions are diagnosed by the patient having a normal skull x-ray, with emphasis on the sinuses to find out if there is accumulation of fluid in them. When fluid is found, a surgical procedure in performed to drain it out. But in cases of normal inflammation of the linings, normal anti-biotics are administered.

So for the education of these ignoramuses who are literally falling over one-another to shout the loudest in a futile attempt to hide Atta-Mills’ current health problems in order to protect their gluttonous stomachs, there is no medical condition called “sinus”. It is rather “sinusitis” which simply means the “inflammation of the inner linings of the sinuses”.

Malignant and benign tumors (cancers)

But in the case of the president, it is now official that he rather suffers from throat cancer. Cancers, if malignant, can easily spread to every part of a person's body, including the brain and render him/her delusional, hallucinating and ultimately mentally deranged. And like I have stated earlier, this spreading of cancerous cells to the vital organs of a person’s body is what is known in medical jargon as metastasis. And this is where Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) and chemotherapy comes in. Therefore the president is clearly suffering from a form of cancer and not sinusitis.

Cancerous cells can also spread to the brain and render a person delusional and hallucinating. And since our constitution debars persons with mental insanity to aspire to the presidency, it is therefore incumbent on us, as a people; to also comprehensively interrogate the mystery surrounding the health of Atta-Mills. This point must be constantly made on all media-platforms by every member of the NPP.

Atta-Mills’ medical records

Now, appearing on 7th September, 2011 edition of Multi-TV’s flagship agenda setting programme, the minority caucus’, the articulate and eloquent national youth organizer of the opposition new patriotic party (NPP), took audience of the programme through the wikkileak cables, and with quotes from our constitution, made a clear case against the sitting president for attain his current position as the first chief executive of the land, through pure deception and fraud.

He argued that the constitution requires anyone aspiring to the high office of a president is obliged to make it known if he/she harbors any illness, particulary that which has to do with a person’s mental sanity.

Mr. Karbo supported his concerns with the president abject dishonesty and shameful deception of the entire Ghanaian populace, when he “lied about the true state of his health by telling the American ambassador that he suffers from mere sinus problem, when infact, he was suffering from a throat cancer” Pointing and actually flipping through two huge dossiers which were in front of him, Mr. Karbo said “these documents in front of me here contain every medical record of Atta-Mills and we managed to obtain them from the medical facility in South Africa where he was frequenting for treatment”.

He express his frustrations with “Nana Akufo-Addo’s constant call on the youth of the NPP to restrain themselves” and not to respond, in like manner, to “NDC indecent politicking” and said “the time has come for the NPP to respond to NDC’s reckless accusations against the NPP flag bearer” and that “admonitions for restraint by Nana Addo” in the face of NDC irresponsible behavior “are no longer going to be adhered to”.

Constitution vrs traditional-custom

Our nation’s constitution requires a prospective president to be a citizen of Ghana, not less than 40-years of age and of sound mind. So for example, if at any point in time, it is found out that a sitting president had lied about any of these three key prerequisites of a prospective president, then the citizens reserve every right under the constitution, to openly question such development and make sure the appropriate sanction is applied.

Forinstance,if it is found out that a sitting president had lied about his/her age and that he/she had not attained the constitutionally mandated age of 40-years at the time of contesting for the presidency, he/she can be duly removed from office. If it is found out that he/she is not a Ghanaian, the same sanction will apply. In much the same way, if it is found that he/she had lied about the sanctity of his mental faculty at the time of contesting for the high office, this will again, attract the same sanction.

However, when such a purely constitutional issue bordering on the health status of Atta-Mills comes up, these sycophants will come out, with all guns blazing, that it is unethical to openly talk about the health of an elderly person in our Ghanaian cultural setting and that our ‘amambre’ (cultural practice) frowns on it. But what these ‘nkwan deewa’ boot-lickers forget is the fact that Atta-Mills became a president on the tenets of our nation’s constitution and not by the dictates of our Ghanaian ‘amambre’.

The president is a total embodiment of the direction in which the nation goes and his/her health status at any point in time, particularly in the developed nations, can even have effect on the stock exchange and other socio-economic activities. Nonetheless, when such incidents happen in these civilized nations, they make sure to apprise the citizens whose taxes pay for the medical bills of their president.

Justice Abeeku Newton-Offei

E-mail: justnoff@yahoo.com