Can anybody tell Ghanaians why the NPP is always excited when workers go on strike or leave their offices to demonstrate? Do the NPP know the economic and political loss to the country when workers go on strike or they don’t care? Do the NPP think that when they incite workers to demonstrate, they will come to power and rule over a different kind of workers? When the NPP get excited when workers go on strike, have they thought of the economic consequences of the workers actions?

If the NPP know the answers to all the above questions, they will be the first to tell the workers to call-off the strike. Because the NPP don’t know the answers to the above questions, that is why they are doing what they are doing. The reason they give for the strike is that what the workers are doing is good for their future. The question is, after retirement and the country is destroyed, what future will the workers have since they will no longer belong to any union? Are the NPP serious about taking power in 2016? If they are, then they should be the first to tell the workers to call-off their strike because, I don’t think the NPP want to take over an economy that has collapsed due to strikes, right?

There is abundant evidence that the NPP are those encouraging the 12 unions to embark on an indefinite strike because they think the government of the NDC has “chopped” the workers money. But they don’t have any evidence and so instead of them encouraging peaceful settlement of the case, they are rather urging the workers on. I hope that Ghanaians are seeing the position the NPP has taken on the workers strike and punish them during elections in 2016. They are nation wreckers. The argument in 2016 would be, you can’t call for the destruction of the economy through strikes, when you really want to come and manage it. It shouldn’t work like that.

Fellow Ghanaians, let’s assume the NPP succeed in letting the workers continue their strike until December 2016, and NDC loses the elections. When the NPP comes to power in January 2017, what kind of economy are they going to manage? What kind of people are they going to rule over? And what kind of country would they govern? Has the NPP thought about these questions or they don’t care? From what I have explained above, are Ghanaians beginning to know the consequences of the actions of the NPP? Has Ghanaians seen that if the NPP really love Ghana, they will not call for its destruction? How do the NPP help destroy a nation and then later want to govern it? That beats my political imagination.

What the NPP is encouraging the workers to do (strike) is like a farmer who has mango, orange, guava, pear, banana on his farm. Because the mango trees are not bearing enough fruits or giving him profits, the farmer decides to go on strike for 3 months. The reason the farmer decided to go on strike was to punish the mango trees for not bringing-in enough profits. Guess what the farmer will see in 3 months’ time when he goes back to the farm. It will not only be the mango trees that would be gone, the whole farm would be gone too. If the NPP is not wise enough to know, it should be told them that by the time their sponsored workers’ strike is over, it will not only be the NDC they have destroyed, they would have succeeded in destroying the whole country as well.

What I just illustrated above is what the NPP is doing in Ghana now. When the 12 public sector workers began their indefinite strike because of their Tier Two pension scheme, the NPP led by Nana Akomea, former Communications Director, was reported by citifmonline.com on October 27, predicting doom for the government labor suit, saying the suit will backfire because the government had no case. In other words, the labor union should continue to do what they are doing and there would be no bitter consequences. The following day, Sammy Awuku, the National Youth Organizer, was on Peace FM saying that the lazy NDC government has “chopped” the workers’ pension funds. He urged the labor unions to go the full length to collect their money and that they should not allow the government to treat them like “school children” As if that was not enough, 3 days later, the Minority Leader in Parliament, Hon. Osei Kyei Mensah-Bonsu was on Peace FM stating emphatically that the workers funds were used by Fortiz to purchase Merchant Bank. (He provided no evidence) I wonder why the BNI has not yet picked up this man and dealt with him. Such dangerous people should not walk free on our streets.

On the other hand, some wise people and organizations who care about the future of the country were begging the striking workers to go back to work. On October 29, the government led by the Minister of Employment and Social Welfare and the National House of Chiefs, through their Registrar, made passionate appeals to the workers to go back to work, while their executives dialogue with government to resolve the impasse over the Second-Tier pension scheme. The following day, the National Labor Commission, also on citifmonline.com appealed to the striking workers to go back to work. The same citifmonline.com reported on October 31, that the court has ordered the labor union to call off their strike. Do you see two different personalities in this paragraph and the one before it?

Ladies and gentlemen, if you have something and you value and cherish it so much, you will always give your last pint of blood to protect it, even if it will take you hundred years to get that thing back. In most of my articles, I have stated in them that the NPP people are not Ghanaians. For example, the NPP people were saying by the end of 2014, the Ghana cedi will be 10 to 1 American dollar. It took the President to ask how a patriotic citizen would wish that for his/her country. I also heard Archbishop Duncan-Williams telling the NPP to stop cursing the economy and the country. Why should the first man of Ghana and the first man of God in Ghana be dragged into the foolishness of the NPP? The NPP people don’t do things and say things like they care about Ghana. All they want is power. If they come to power and the country is like ghost country and inflation running at 1000%, they don’t care. Its all about power.

Fellow Ghanaians, think about this. How do you give your destiny to someone who wants to destroy it now and later wants to govern it? The NPP wants to destroy Ghana now, comes to power and give Ghanaians excuses as to why they can’t use 4 years to fix it. They will forget that they contributed to its destruction. We the people of Ghana should not be prepared to listen to such excuses anymore. They are excuses of the past. While the NPP was urging workers to continue with their strike action to destabilize the economy, the Electoral Commission was working by displaying the voter register for various corrections, and the President was in Europe looking for investors and partners to grow the economy. When the NPP loses the 2016 elections, guess who they will blame? The Electoral Commission and the NDC. They will never blame their misplaced priorities. The NPP should know that Strikes and demonstrations don’t win elections. Votes do. In future, the Labor Unions should be made to pay the salaries of their striking workers. That will be one way the NPP will stop using the workers to destroy our country. A country some of us love so much. A country that is worth dying for. God bless Ghana and make that nation great and strong, under the able leadership of HE President John Dramani Mahama.

Lawrence Appiah-Osei (Protocol)

Public Relations Officer (PRO)

NDC Washington Metro Branch

Appiah65@Hotmail.com