“A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers whispering through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself” — Marcus Tullius Cicero.
The movie titled, ‘Sleeping with the enemy’ was the first thing that came to mind when I first heard of the early retirement of IGP’s Executive Secretary, Supt. Peter Lanchene Tuubo, to pave way for him to contest the MP slot of the eagle-headed Umbrella in the Wa West Constituency. I was thus pleasantly surprised when Chairman Allotey Jacobs of Zu-za referred to the same movie during a radio discussion on the same topic. All I did was to soliloquize, “Great minds indeed think alike.”
The movie starred Julia Roberts (Laura), who had to fake her death in order to flee from her violent husband, Patrick Bergin (Martin). Laura leaves Cape Cod and moves to Iowa, where she adopts a new identity and starts dating a local teacher, Kevin Anderson (Ben). Martin later unearths evidence suggesting that she isn’t dead and he tracks her to Iowa. He finds Laura and Ben and confronts them, forcing her to fight for her life once again.
Though same did not play out in the case of the IGP and Tuubo, it is worth noting that there is betrayal of trust in both stories. Unless the IGP himself is a closet Zu-za member, Tuubo’s action should be giving him sleepless nights.
The country woke up last week to the shocking news of Tuubo’s early retirement in order to openly wear his political garb. Two other policemen have done same, but what made Tuubo’s situation worrying is the fact that he was a senior officer who was also part of the day to day running of the service. Considering the fact that he was responsible for compiling all security briefs for the IGP and also sat in almost all security meetings with the President and the National Security Council, his decision to join the leading opposition party in the country raises a lot of eyebrows.
It is now clear to me and my compatriots why Elder ‘Kidnapper’ confidently said some senior police officers were sympathetic to the Umbrella. We are also now aware of how Zu-za got to know of CID’s decision to arrest their party Chairman days before it happened.
The argument that Tuubo was a professional is very laughable, to say the least. How could he have been professional in his actions after being a card-bearing member of the Elephant for not less than 4 years before his early retirement? This is evident from the Zu-za constitution, which states that one has to be a card-bearing member of the party for at least 4 years before being eligible to contest.
If what Tuubo himself said is anything to go by, then one could confidently say that he has covertly been wearing the Umbrella shirt for close to 10 years before his early retirement. For how could his party people be imploring upon him to contest since 2010 if he wasn’t a card-bearing member of the party?
Months earlier, he was on Facebook live lamenting that everybody was potentially corrupt and not a case peculiar to the Ghana Police Service. He even narrated a beautiful story to buttress his point.
But we now know better, don’t we? It is now obvious that it was just a PR stunt to make him look patriotic and professional. Indeed, the wind has blown and exposed the messy anus of the fowl.
Frankly, the country should be thankful to the Bearded Old Man above for making Tuubo go on early retirement. Can you imagine the damage he would have caused the Nana Dee government if he had been at post till the 2020 polls?
I would be very worried if I were the President or a member of his national security team. I would ask myself how many Tuubos were still in the service and the strategies to use to uproot such bad seeds. I would wonder what information had already been leaked and how to neutralize its effect. I would ask myself if indeed transfers in recent times within the service were deliberate machinations to put pro-Umbrella officers in key positions.
It is, however, gratifying to note that the current IGP would be retiring by the end of August this year. The government must do a thorough background investigation before choosing a new IGP. The new IGP’s Executive Secretary and close aides should go through same. Otherwise, another snitch as Executive Secretary to the IGP may spell doom for the Nana Dee government.
See you next week for another interesting konkonsa, Deo volente!