Point Of Order
By
Kwame Gyasi
E-mail: makgyasi@ug.edu.gh
The Akans have two proverbs which I consider very apt at this time of electioneering period considering the belligerent, petulant, arrogant, disrespectful, querulous, disdainful attitude of the Chairperson of the Electoral Commission (EC) and her constituency towards the good people of this country. She keeps on trying to remind the good people of this country of her independence and that of the EC and the source of her power and that of the EC. She creates the impression that she is not answerable to anybody and that she can commit no sin. She keeps on telling the good people of this country that anybody aggrieved by the decisions of the EC can go to court. In this respect, she has not learnt any lessons from her disgraced predecessor who behaved like a well-fed pig on heat daring the NPP to go to court. By telling any aggrieved person to go to court, at least, in her warped ignorance, she accepts that there is a power greater than what she and her EC claim to wield which can overturn any decisions taken by the motley crowd she represents.
Unfortunately, in her period of steep ignorance, she forgets that she cannot talk of independence in isolation without linking it to integrity and accountability. She and her other commissioners are fully accountable to the good people of this country and should display integrity in whatever they do. It is the taxpayers’ money which is used to finance her and the EC to perform a job which requires it to be done with utmost good faith since she and the other commissioners stand in fiduciary relationship towards the country. She and her other commissioners should act at all times in what they believe to be the best interests of the country as a whole so as to preserve the sanctity of the electoral process and to defend the Constitution in such manner as faithful, diligent, careful and ordinarily skillful commissioners would act in the circumstances. At least, the Nigerians have established a minimum standard of test for us.
What she must also note is that even absolute freedom must have rules to define that freedom and once you establish rules, you are at the same time establishing red lines you cannot cross. Again the only person who was deemed not to have ever committed any sin was nailed on the cross, wrongfully though it might seem otherwise to a lot of people. Again the Akans have a proverb which says that the chief who does not listen to wise counsel is made to eat meal made of vulture which is presented to him as meal made of fowl. The Akans have another proverb that says that as people praise your tree climbing ability and skills, then it is your hunch back they are referring to in the praise.
John Dramani Mahama in his usual corrupt, criminal, incompetent NDC administration which he represents breeched the rules in appointing the current Chairperson of the EC at a time when a case dealing with the appointment was still pending in court. Since her appointment, she and the EC have done not a single thing right which meets the test of utmost good faith. Every act of commission and omission of her and the EC appear to be dictated from the corrupt, criminal incompetent John Dramani Mahama NDC administration. She has spurned all good advice to act impartially and rather prefer to act in party partisan interest which favours the NDC and her mentor. Sadly enough, there have been commentators who instead of referring to her official functions and adding their voices to the heap of good advices some patriots have offered her rather dwell on the physical features God gave to her. I have heard and read about people referring to her as beautiful. Of course beauty lies with the beholder. And for a man, in particular, to refer to a woman as beautiful transcendences many different issues.
This county has in the past and present witnessed occupants of the State House who prefer women with heavy buttocks as their beautiful companions. As the Ga will say: “duna nee”, to wit: “what a buttocks”. I am equally aware of men who go crazy about women with heavy breasts. That is how they define beauty in a woman. Others go in for women with beautiful Coca-Cola bottle shaped legs. Oh yes, I almost forget about the men who look for voluminous lips. There is one basic factor underlying all these. The male sexual organ once it enters the “Black Hole of Calcutta”, it must spit fire before it can be released. Then again as the Ga will say: Eba gidigidi, ete blew”. to wit: “it comes with speed but it leaves slowly”. Once the fire is churned out, thereafter it needs stimulus like electric shock to wake it up again for another round just like the type of electric shock the heart surgeon administers on a patient whose heart he has operated on to bring it back to life.
Different men rely on different parts of the woman’s body for the electric shock to stimulate their male organs. Hence the different definition of a woman’s beauty. But all these types of identified beauty are vain. The most essential beauty is the beauty of the mind. That was why it was said of old that if you want to be Caesar’s wife, you must not only be physically beautiful but you must also be morally beautiful. So far the EC under the leadership of the Chairperson has not shown any iota of moral beauty. It has been one act of gross incompetence from one act to another clouded by the desire to ensure that the corrupt, criminal, incompetent John Dramani Mahama NDC administration is voted into power against the popular wishes of the people of this country who are asking for a change. The people of this country have come to a crossroad, a sort of melting point where even if the EC decides to disqualify all the presidential candidates except John Dramani Mahama and Akua Donkor, the good people of this country will vote for Akua Donkor for want of better choice, and leave John Dramani Mahama in midstream to drown.
Today, every NDC apparatchik who has his or her ears on the ground knows that the corrupt, criminal incompetent John Dramani Mahama is going to lose the elections. Now it has put massive fright and fear in the NDC parliamentary candidates. It could lead to a bandwagon affecting the NDC parliamentary candidates. That is why they are pushing the voter transfer exercise like people who are fighting for the last position in heaven. The presidential vote has one constituency so transfer of votes will not have any effect. Indeed, many NDC parliamentary candidates have been going round their constituencies dishing out twenty cedi notes to the electorates pleading with them that they can vote for Nana Akufo-Addo but vote for the NDC parliamentary candidate.
There are some educated people who have praised the EC Chairperson for her audacity to disqualify 12 presidential candidates. What they are doing is praising her fast developing hunch-back. Indeed, a fool has said in his heart that there is no God. In fact, if the EC Chairperson had any finesse and possessed any competence and had followed the law to the letter as she claimed in disqualifying the 12 presidential candidates, most of the political parties, some of which were resurrected from the grave by the EC to attend the forum on the bloated voters register would have been delisted long ago before they could even dare to present presidential candidates for them to stand disqualified. Why is the EC Chairperson in the wrong gear with her commissioners? As it was written by James Ene Henshaw in his book, THIS IS OUR CHANCE, “A mighty wind shall blow”.