Opinions of Wednesday, 17 April 2024

Columnist: Magnus Naabe RexDanquah

The greatest scam ever since Ackah Blay Miezah’s gold deposits claim

Ackah Blay Miezah Ackah Blay Miezah

"Breaking the eight’ is a smokescreen/cover to perpetuate the agyapadie ‘family & friends’ continued capture of state control of ‘everything."

I am not a prophet, so I won’t say, "This is what the Lord says"?

I, also, do not know what reincarnation is nor believe in it as I know two people will never have the same DNA, so it isn’t as if I have lived this life before to appreciate hindsight and be able to tell for sure what lies ahead of us as a nation and as a people for the next how many months to the 2024 Elections and consequences thereafter; however, I feel so agitated in my spirit to the extent of knowing that the year, 2024 will not be a normal year, not for the elections ahead; nor all the noises of ‘BREAKING ANY 8’ at any or all cost with the consequences therefrom; but that all the known astrologers are all predicting caution in all matters or affairs of men.

Prophets and all kinds of ‘Men of God’ of all shades of colour, creed and denomination, are cautioning that “IF ANYBODY KNOWS HOW TO PRAY TO TOUCH THE HEART OF GOD ALMIGHTY’ THEN SUCH A PERSON SHOULD COMMIT TO PRAYERS NOW WITHOUT CEASING” so that we may avert what seemingly looks like the gloom ahead of us, as we plan how to celebrate this year’s Christmas, post-elections 2024 and welcome the new year, 2025 with the installation of a new president of the 4th Republic.

One of the most articulated political straplines ever in Ghana’s political history since independence is the ‘BREAKING THE EIGHT’ mantra of the New Patriotic Party (NPP); conceived by the Akyem Mafia post the victory of the 2016 Elections and very well-articulated succinctly on the night of victory in 2020.

You see the whole story of the mantra of ‘Breaking The Eight’ has found expression in the story of JOHN ACKAH BLAY-MIEZAH, born as John Kolorah Blay and lived from 1941 to 1992 as the greatest Ghanaian con artist.

John Kolorah Blay was born into a humble Nzema family in Ghana’s Western Region in 1941.

In 1959, he migrated to the United States, settling in Philadelphia, claiming he was following in the footsteps of late Dr. Kwame Nkrumah in studying at the University of Pennsylvania, while in actuality working as a waiter at the Union League Club. Later he would successfully appropriate the identity of a former roommate – claiming a change of name – and for a time be recognized as having received a bachelor’s degree from the Wharton School and a master’s degree in international relations.

Shortly after returning to Ghana in 1963, he was arrested and sent to Nsawam Prison for making vague claims about a threat to President Nkrumah’s life. In 1966, after Nkrumah was overthrown in a coup d’état, he was freed. - WIKIPEDIA

By the early 1970s, he was variously claiming to be a President of the African Development Bank or a medical doctor and the son of noted jurist, Robert Samuel Blay. By 1972 he had returned to Philadelphia, claiming to be a diplomat, and set himself up at the Bellevue-Stratford Hotel. After the Ghanaian mission refused to pay the nearly USD$2,644.00 bill he’d accumulated, he was sentenced to prison for posing as a diplomat and stiffing a hotel.

In 1974, he claimed that he had inherited 160 million dollars from Daniel Wilbold Layman and announced at a press conference that he planned to invest 6 million dollars in various projects in the Nzema area. In 1975, he was arrested at Kotoka International Airport in Accra as he was about to board, a Ghana Airways VC 10 airliner for London.

He was arrested for having 7,700.00 US Dollars and £940 sterling which he allegedly failed to declare. Blay-Miezah also managed to convince Acheampong’s government of 47 billion in Swiss Banks. He was given a diplomatic passport and then relocated to Europe.- WIKIPEDIA

In 1979, his party, People’s Vanguard, was issued a provisional certificate of registration by the Office of the Electoral Commissioner. His party didn’t gain any credibility and the initials of his party were popularly said to mean ‘Pay Voucher’.

The late Ackah Blay-Miezah was a pioneer of advance-fee fraud. He claimed to be worth USD$47 billion. From the 1960s to the 1980s, he is said to have swindled over USD$200m from victims in North America, Europe, and Asia. He was named “the Ultimate Con Man” by 60 Minutes.

He claimed to be the sole beneficiary of the ‘Oman Ghana Trust Fund’ and that to access the funds, he needed money. He claimed that the trust was endowed by the late Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, Ghana’s Founding President of the 1st Republic. He promised to pay USD$10.00 for every USD$1.00 he received. His supporters included Ako Adjei, John N. Mitchell, and several of Nkrumah’s cabinet ministers.- WIKIPEDIA

In 1986, he was jailed in Ghana on a charge of economic sabotage. He allegedly worked with Robert Ellis to run the fraud since 1972.

In 1989, 60 Minutes ran a piece on him saying that despite accumulating close to $1 billion using his story, he had not paid out a dime. He died before authorities had an opportunity to get back any of the money he’d stolen.

He was put under house arrest for deceiving the PNDC government in Accra and died on 30 June 1992. Even in his death, he sowed confusion among his family by claiming that he had some $15 billion in an offshore bank.

In May 1997, the High Court declared that the will of Blay-Miezah presented by Dr. John R. Kells, a confidant, was valid. This decision was appealed but the Appeal Court in November 1999, upheld the decision by a two-one majority. In 2001, Supreme Court revoked the probates granted by an Accra High Court. The appeal was filed by Dr. Ebenezer Ako-Adjei, and Mr. F. K. Mensah, nephew of Blay-Miezah. -WIKIPEDIA

The ‘scam’ of Ackah Blay-Miezah is akin to the current ‘BREAKING THE EIGHT’ soap opera or the ‘CHRONICLES OF WE-HAVE-THE-MEN’, which will continue to pan out live before our own very eyes for the next eight (8) months or more.

Indeed, the ‘Breaking The Eight’ mantle, which found expression in the ‘AGAPADIE’ document, is a ‘con’ job, that seeks to deprive, swindle or deceive the Ghanaian populace into accepting that it is in our grand interest that the ‘friends and family’ Akyem mafia cabal, the ‘heavens-ordained’ wisemen under a new disguise, continues as the next government post - 2024 Elections to have exclusive custody as well as management control of all resources, including minerals for and on behalf of the people and their descendants in perpetuity.

Truth be told, the real argument isn’t about who succeeds the current President of the 4th Republican Dispensation but the extent to which they are driving the case for why his Vice President for almost eight years of the same party ought to be the one to succeed him at all cost.

The reason or reasons aren’t far-fetched by any stretch of the imagination because the facts on the ground are clear as the sky: to perpetuate the continued control and management of the resources of the state by the same ‘family and friends’ syndicate; and why the greatest scam ever.

Nobody should be deceived, especially as the people are changing from the old way of thinking that even when you nominate a ‘cat’ or a ‘fowl’ under the flag of any political party, the followers and party faithful will vote without looking at their states of life and or the economy.

The old way of politics as usual is changing so fast that it isn’t funny anymore.

The people are now interrogating the contents of the political manifestos than before. The media, apart from the ‘pirates’ are now questioning politicians more than before. The easy access to the internet has broadened the perceptions of the ordinary Ghanaian to see beyond the guises of ‘wolf in sheep's clothing’ parading as ‘holier than thou’ citizens than their old ‘rich bourgeoisie’ look and character.

They are selfishly materialistic, upholding the interests of the capitalist class of ‘family and friends’, taking over all government lands across the country, selling to themselves all government properties and companies, and assigning to themselves all rights intended for the general good.

This is the scam we are now faced with as a people and as a nation and if we do not come to a full realization and team together to fight this, we will become servants in our own fathers’ houses; or worse, contend with the pigs at their pigsties for the leftovers they throw from their feasts’ tables.

The 2024 National Elections is the new ‘INDEPENDENCE DAY’ that we all have to join hands and fight for, not for ourselves as Ghanaians but for our children and children’s children; our future as a nation and as a people; a joint fight to rid ourselves of ‘French Ghanaians’ by their lifestyles or the ‘English Ghanaians’ by their tastes.

This is the fight we cannot afford to lose because we are almost a ‘failed state’ on the brink of bankruptcy with all bloated expenditures over the last seven years; loans collateralized over 20 (twenty), 30 (thirty), and 40 (forty) years, when they will be nowhere to be part of the process of liquidating them; and where these loans were more for consumption than investment.

This call is beyond partisan politics; this is the call for A NEW INDEPENDENCE DAY: a call beyond parochial, opinionated, factional, prejudiced, or sectarian interests; tribes, and or regions. This is the call for the future of our country, the ‘NEW GHANA’, where no voice is too small not to be heard; and where we will all get involved in a new participatory democracy as every voice matters.

Need I say or write anymore?