Appearance, they say, is deceptive. And by their fruits ye shall know them. Now the cat is out of the bag and as they have turned new leaves to show their true characters, you need not be surprised as recent revelations by the otherwise two gentlemen of the NPP – Mr. Kwame Pianim and Dr. Kobina Arthur Kennedy, have equally thrown bombshells to the wind. As if the two gentlemen had some telepathy instincts; while the youngster tried to claim credit by launching his ‘devilish’ book entitled ‘Chasing the Elephant to the Bush’ that has brought about misgivings and furore as to his credibility and/or loyalty to the Great Party, the septuagenarian politician and economist, Pianim also never got any other platform to launch his vitriolic attack on his own party than to vouch his ‘satanic’ testimony at the doorstep at the presidency – the Osu Castle, Accra, where His Excellency was the host and his dear friend, ‘Good Samaritan’ Pianim, whose presence on such occasions at those particular times still have become a mystery. Who in the first place invited him there let alone to become the presidential Guest of Honour? Did Kwame Pianim want to please his host with the firm presidential fiat and promise of a ministerial or ambassadorial appointment in the near future by openly attesting to the incorruptibility of Prof. Mills no matter the ultimate consequences on his integrity? Meanwhile, the million-dollar questions on the lips of all discerning persons are – what did he go to do at the Castle on those two occasions; again, who were those he saw delivering the supposedly brown envelopes to his host that he personally declined, rejected, returned and cautioned the giver(s) to go and sin no more?

STOOPING SO LOW

Does he know that by stooping so low to strip himself naked and engage in navel gazing with his two natural balls hanging in the presence of Prez. Mills and to cheapen himself to do the PR gimmick for the president was to cut a long story short. In short, it was a disgrace and a serious indictment on the president. Where are the Justice Francis Emile Shorts and the Anna Bossmans now? Are they alive and kicking, recuperating at the hospitals or convalescing at home hence the total silence? Do we take them as toothless bulldogs that could only bark but not bite? Now that their services are needed most, it seems they must have recoiled into their shells. I charge the law enforcing agencies now – the SFO and the CHRAG - not to spare him the big rod but to haul him and arraigned before the law courts to show the culprits without delay or face the bullet for opening his mouth too wide and if need be, to impeach the president for this callous behaviour and actions of the two personalities. This loose talk from Pianim could easily serve as the useful ammunition and weapon for any interested litigant to impeach the president but in a country where civility and democracy have been thrown to the dogs, your guess could be as good as mine. Incidentally, glaring cases of embezzlement/corruption by Mubarak Muntaka that ought to have been thoroughly scrutinized and investigated well by the appropriately mandated constitutional bodies such as the SFO/CHRAG were arrogantly and unconstitutionally referred to institutions that clearly had nothing to do with them but surreptitiously nailed to the coffin for premature burial. How then do you expect our democracy to thrive well to enhance the rule of law pertaining in most civilized countries? I dare say civility here because as at now, nothing has been heard of the Muntakagate Scandal from the rooftops which as clear as crystal ice, the BNI/ National Security had no business doing by covering up this scenario of the millennium. Instead of allowing this to be handled by the appropriate agencies, they had the guts to annul this disgraceful episode and rather engaged in very trivial things such as chasing cars etc. Some quarters even speculate that the number one executive must have had connivance with the BNI/National Security to repel the first shot of pebble from the catapult that was unleashed on the government hence the hypocrite attitude of their rank.

WOLVES IN SHEEP’S SKIN

By their recent disclosures these prominent personalities have tried to white-wash themselves but in vain, and in doing so have rather dragged themselves to the gutter. Literally, they have washed their dirty linen and dried it in the open air. Hear Pianim say to Kwabena Kwakye, the host of Oman FM radio station, ‘If you are a journalist, are you now a CID, or BNI? If you want to interview me, do so but to ask me questions as if you’re a CID or BNI, I’m not prepared to budge’. When he realized that he was being pushed too much to the wall to expose his shallow mindedness despite his academic laurels as an international economist bla, bla, bla, and saw that he had no leeway for an escape chute, despite his fluency, tried to think fast to recoil to re-strategize to become angry with the interviewer to save face, but his trick didn’t work to perfection. He must be ashamed with himself and bow down his head in shame as well as to serve as a sign of conceding defeat. When Pianim inadvertently opened his mouth wide at the Castle to make history for himself and become famous at the expense of his patented NPP as if possessed by the modern day goddess of the sun, he never knew there would be a day for reckoning to account for his reckless speech. The barrage of insinuations/comments from dissent views of people on air, the print and electronic media are all clear pointer that they have been condemned to ‘death by firing squad’ before their natural death.

THE GOOD OLD BOOK

The good old book has indicated that by their fruits, ye shall know them and today, all Ghanaians especially those who want to sieve the seed from the chaff now know the stuff he’s made of. Genuinely, these persons have demonstrated that they were wolves in sheep’s skins; but illustrated their character with humility to warrant the gracious appointment of the chair of the PURC from the ex-President, Mr. Kufuor. The latter-day-saint and convert, Arthur Kennedy, was unexpectedly and un-meritoriously appointed as the Director of Communications of Nana Akufo Addo’s campaign team for the 2008 ‘Second World War’ between the NPP & NDC (December 28, 2008) even though he obtained just one single vote out of the total 2,300 or so votes cast. Because they wanted to become good mixers, they tried to interplay with the rank and file of the party members. Indeed, the overall members and supporters were lucky not to have been devoured by these deadly wolves that had infiltrated the camp of the NPP because vulnerable as most of us were, and knowing the lifestyle of wolves as predators of sheep in particular, all of us would have become victims to their wicked machinations. Now, we have known their true characters, but until then, we never knew them; not even before we conducted a forensic test to examine them critically, we would still not be able to know.

TRAITOR OR REINCARNATED ‘JUDAS ISCARIOT’

A traitor is a very trusted person who discreetly betrays his friend or someone to a third party (for money, position or its equivalent) and behaves as if nothing had taken place on the quiet. On the other hand, such a person undermines his friend or boss to the extremes for no just cause and tries to wear a smiling face. In the scriptures, we know of one of the twelve disciples of our Lord Jesus Christ, Judas Iscariot. Because he knew Jesus could save himself from arrest by the Roman soldiers if the worse came to the worst, betrayed his boss for peanuts – just 30 pieces of silver and when he realized Jesus did not perform his usual miracle to save himself but in order that the age old biblical prophecy might be fulfilled (since he knew he held the keys and power over death, he would resurrect on the third day) for all nations to see rather humbled himself as if he were a sheep prepared for the slaughter. Judas, sensing danger from his colleagues, fled from the hostile crowd and horrible scene and went to hang himself later. Many Ghanaians know the Arthur Kennedys of the late 70s and how he proved to be a critic of governments that did not practice democracy. But one may ask, how and why did he decide to stay for as long as 30 years outside Ghana without thinking about his compatriots until he got wind that his mother party, the NPP was to elect a flag-bearer to contest the just ended elections before he untied the shackles stuck to his feet to come to Ghana when he realized his compatriots had deflated the wind out of the sail of the PNDC/NDC so it became incumbent upon him to safely come him when food was already prepared and placed on table.

THE PROVERBIAL ENGLISH JOKE

Having lost totally at the congress and been offered the prestigious and enviable position of Communi -cations Director of the NPP by the party’s candidate, one would have thought that he would examine himself first as to why his outfit failed in its bid to capture the enviable prize of the golden fleece, but went ahead to launch a book that has heightened tempers in the NPP and offered stimulant to the opponents across the length and breadth of the country. Virtually, according to people who have read and digested this book in question, there is no mention of his inability to embark upon any meaningful communication skills to emerge victorious; so for the learned medical doctor to drop his bombshell was like leading the British soldiers with knowledge in conventional warfare to march up against the Ashantis and fight them in the forest. Like the proverbial English joke, ‘The white-man brings his canoe to the forest but the forest was stronger than the canoe’. In effect, the British troops who came to the Gold Coast to fight the stubborn Ashantis in their own backyard had to acclimatize at Cape Coast for a few weeks during which period they underwent de-briefing on tropical warfare before embarking upon their journey upcountry on foot through the bush where prevalence of malaria, wild reptiles and all sorts of tropical diseases dealt deadly blow to their numbers before a first shot was fired. The Ashantis were traditionally forest dwellers who were immune to the various diseases of the tropics so for the whites to engage them in jungle warfare and still be mindful of their health and their family reunion back home in England across the Atlantic was akin to Kennedy’s criminal book which sought to win public sympathy for him rather backfired because his presidential ambition was negated when in his anxiety to lead this country was amplified by securing only one single vote out of the total 2,300 or so votes cast at the December 22, 2007 congress.

STOMACH POLITICIANS AND UNPRINCIPLED PERSONALITIES

Unlike the advanced economies where politicians stick to principles, this scenario seems to be a lacking ingredient in most parts of Africa and Ghana is no exception at all. Since Ghana’s independence in March, 1957 there have been quite a number of politicians who have tried to align themselves with almost all the political parties or governments that have come to manage the affairs of this country. Even though some may have genuine intentions to be party to such governments; others who neither belonged to the right, left, centre-right nor centre-left, would do everything possible to parade the corridors of power for consideration just to satisfy their stomachs thereby throwing their dignity to the dogs despite the harm such undignified stance might cause their families and the future generation. A couple of dignified personalities such as the late Justice Nii Amaa Ollenu, Justice Samuel Azu Crabbe, Prof. Nana S.K.B. Asante, Prof. Emeritus Daasebre Oti Boateng, Brig. (Rtd.) Agyemfra of the IEA and a few others ought to have their names written in gold when the history of Ghana is written about this generation and those ‘greedy and hungry politicians both military and civilian’ whose stomachs very often dictated the pace and individual destinies because they were unprincipled and more often than not could not adjust and adapt themselves under trying moments and circumstances, swayed to wherever ‘food’ was always available for their fill and ill-gotten booty also for grabs. Such people were good organizers but not managers of state because morally, they were not upright and had to satisfy their selfish ends to the detriment of others who were more vulnerable to food, shelter and good health care delivery. It is therefore not strange that Mr. Pianim has sold his hard earned reputation, political birthright, prestige, worldwide recognition and respect he had built over the years for such pittance of a speculated ministerial/ambassadorial appointment. We await the outcome of his utterance and his ultimate prize from the president.

RWANDAN JOURNALIST

As a result of the queer behaviour put up by the infamous utterances of the duo, the future generation would never forget and forgive their families and descendants for the reckless way they have shown their behaviour in recent times. To borrow excerpts from the Rwandan lady journalist, Valerie Bemerike, who’s been jailed for life for war crimes by the International Court of Justice at The Hague, Netherlands, for allegedly inciting her Hutu tribesmen to annihilate their Tutsis compatriots in Rwanda as a result of which some 800,000 precious lives were lost in the 1994 genocide, she was quoted as repeatedly saying on air as thus - ‘Do not kill those cockroaches with a bullet – cut them into pieces with a machete’. By implication and inference, she meant that her tribesmen should not waste bullets to kill their rivals or enemies but to use the bayonets at the tip of their rifles to pierce their opponents. What many decent people perceive to happen in future could be that the younger generation of Ghana might retaliate and re-visit the families/descendants (great-great grand -children) of these persons and the tribesmen of a couple of others who had selfishly looted this nation and messed up and rendered them second fiddle humans as well as impoverishing greater masses of the citizenry. Even though some known and prominent persons who should have done much better for Ghana, but due to personal greed, pettiness and selfishness, derailed our economic advancement. These people tried to be the bane to our national development agenda and for very long time served as barrier and great hurdle in our political forward march to tick anti-clockwise. Some would be dead and gone, but when the history of this nation comes to be written, those who exhibited patriotism and became celebrities would have their names printed boldly in gold, but for those who used draconian means to loot the national kitty to improve the lifestyles of their children and their families would never be spared anywhere on this planet earth because their unpatriotic nefarious actions must be equally retaliated with evil for their cruel, wicked and greedy mischief and that would be when the peeved and the grieving cheated majority through no fault of theirs would rise up and mercilessly cut the beneficiaries of the national booty into pieces with machetes. Kofi Appiah

email: kofiappiah2002@hotmail.com