It is the beginning of 2016 and Ghana is on tenterhooks. An election is coming up and we are not certain if the country can stand together to see the end of the year when we can vote and have a say whether we retain a Mahama government or usher in a new NPP government with Nana Addo at the helm
All we know is there is a series of corruption allegations and we are accusing everyone of committing one grievous sin or the other.
Of course, in the mix are all the corrupt elements that have in the previous seven years gotten away with cover-ups and sideswiping by persons in positions whose job has now degenerated into one of uncertainty of tenure.
The NDC have become belligerent and the insults are flying left and center, backside covering is the order of the day.
But nothing is more significant than the challenges we face with the Electoral Commission and the posture of the EC Chairperson, who has been accused of all kinds of immoral issues, even suggestions that she is in bed, literally, with the President of the day.
These are worrying times. We lurch from one day to the next filing cases in court to pressure the Commission to do its job and guarantee the integrity of the voters register. The roll numbers are uncertain, names are being bumped off the list, sudden fines are being imposed and some of the smaller political parties are clearly at a gross disadvantage.
For the dominant political parties, there is no fear that they will be sidelined, even those who have not filed their annual returns as required by the election laws. They neither fear the Commission nor Parliament in this regard, because neither party can afford to tip the cart to any degree in favour of the opponent.
So roll on December 7 and before we get there we have done everything under the sun to prove that we have a completely bloated register with padded names in all the regions. But our biggest fear is that somehow the election will be rigged to retain the NDC Government.
As we struggle and pile up points against the ruling party, the electorate are calmed to remain resolute and not accept gift tokens of any sort and if they are so inclined, please go ahead, but keep your vote true and unwavering.
And so we went on day after day, until we voted on the 7th of December and then welcomed the dissipated cacophony just hoping that we had done enough as a nation to maintain our sanity and preserve the one thing our democracy has shorn. We will stay a peace loving nation and keep the light glowing in a place known for its fighting and chaos after an election, power sharing arrangements at the behest of the incumbent bent on retaining a lie of destruction should we dare announce an exit and hand over to another.
Then the results. A resounding victory for integrity and a small miracle that Ghanaians had finally understood that a message for stability and continuity is squarely in their hands and must be protected even in the face of extreme odds biased towards incumbency.
Now see what we have in our mix.
The persons we put in place to safeguard the electoral process are fingering each other, incriminating themselves and destroying the façade of integrity they pretended to promote.
Charlotte Osei and her deputies are fighting a media war on frivolity. These childish charges for removal of office by a group of persons, unknown, unmentioned but pointed at by the Chairperson herself only serves to justify what Ghanaians believed in all through 2016. This group of officers were up to no good.
But were we looking up the wrong stairway to democracy? While we were fighting to keep the electoral roll disinfected, they were looking at the loopholes in the procurement process and awarding contracts beyond their purview. This is what Charlotte Osei and her team are telling us. Their focus was on the jockeying for position in an Institution clearly locked in a power struggle to retain positions and if possible, do each other in wherever necessary.
But I feel betrayed. I relied on the processes and structures we have in place to safeguard the integrity of our democracy, and see how easy it is to bastardize the whole set up. The President promoted a young and elegant upstart above the heads of persons who might have been more reliable and their disaffection with processes and management ability pushed us all for a period of a year and maybe more, to the point where we even started to think “civil war”.
But that was not their agenda. Theirs was to ensure that a better path would be cleared so they could run rampage over all the administration and rake in what they knew was available. We were in total darkness as we blindly sought true democracy and dedication to duty from a staff that was totally diverted from what was proper.
In the end, we might find out what is the real truth when an impeachment process kicks in and we are able to push the prosecutors to get to the bottom of it all.
Why do we have persons in authority who we trust will abide by the rules and ensure that processes, painfully laid down will be followed and our hard earned taxes will be preserved and used for the good of the people of this country?
I have to say this is a week when I doff my hat to Parliament. Two weeks or so ago I came under a barrage of a media circus when I was “recommended” for contempt of Parliament. That case has not been decided yet, but I need to say that right is proper when it is the truth and I find it very rewarding that Parliament decided to postpone the Independent Prosecutor’s Bill and allow more time to make it a better law with more input from citizens. It is a lesson in how to do things properly and what is expected from the legislature, that bills and contracts brought before the House need time to be read through and corrected so we don’t have a “Towing Law” that gives all the roadside levies to a single person whose business processes are already questionable not only in Ghana but also in other parts of Africa.
It is time for us to strengthen this fight against the corruption elements. Time for the minority NDC to stop making frivolous statements and negating the gains we are making, with particularly the economy and development. This fight we are in is not so much about the rules and laws we can pass, it is about economic stability and creating a better life for all of us who want to stay in this country and see it become a better place to live in.
We need institutional heads to stay the course and do what is right without dictates from politicians. We need the institutional heads to commit to the people of Ghana and not to each other and the loot they can share. We have to get out of this cesspit of corruption and stop betraying the confidence citizens have reposed in our “big men and women” because we want to trust that they have our future at heart.
Maybe we need to impeach some persons in order to drive this message home.
Ghana. Aha a y? d? papa. Alius valde week advenio. Another great week to come.
By Sydney Casely-Hayford, thenewghanaian@gmail.com