Kwabena Amikaketo sat in his favourite chair on his balcony, viewing the setting sun which was making way for the shadows to grow longer and soon cover his part of the world like a dark blanket.
That evening, his thoughts travelled back down into memory lane and opened up the files on the events of a certain journalist called Anas Amereyaw Anas. Many, many years past, he was just an ordinary journalist making ripples in the industry, and gradually rose to fame when he intelligently did some undercover work to expose some top appointees of Jerry Rawlings’ government.
In a blink of an eye, Anas started doing real investigative journalism, where he would go undercover and come out with what could be classified as the rot in any establishment of his choice.
One thing Kwabena Amikaketo felt uneasy about was that unlike other top world investigative journalists, fame and popularity ate into the head of Anas. He would always love to openly patent his works in the brand name of “Name and Shame.”
Anas wanted to portray himself as the only clean fellow in Africa, and would do all he could to fish out corrupt malpractices, even when there may be none. When he exposed our judges, some of them claimed what was shown on the silver screen was not what actually happened, especially when there was voice over what they were saying, so that what they actually said was not audible.
Then his exposé on soccer in Ghana and Africa raised some eyebrows, and he actually bribed a referee who was to officiate a match between Accra Hearts of Oak and Asante Kotoko, and made him award victory to the Accra-based club. What got Kwabena mad was that these two teams met one day, and a referee took a decision against Kotoko, which created clashes among spectators, resulting in hundreds of people losing their lives.
And it was another match between these two clubs which Anas went ahead and bribed a referee to officiate against Kotoko. What if disaster had occurred again and hundreds lost their lives? Who will take that blame?
That whole exposé, which saw the fall of one of Ghana’s finest, Kwesi Nyantakyi, and doomed our hopes to see him secure an enviable position in FIFA, was considered not good enough evidence to stand on in any court of justice by two of Ghana’s brilliant lawyers, the immediate past Attorney General, Marietta Brew Appiah-Oppong, and the current one, Gloria Akuffo. Yet, for some reasons, Kwesi was stripped off his international privileges in soccer, including his presidential role in the Ghana Football Association (GFA).
So, to date, as we speak, no court had been able to persecute any of those named and shamed by Anas, except in the court of public opinion, and to Kwabena, actions taken by governments were just to satisfy the masses and indicate that they were, indeed, out to fight corruption.
So, in a way, to satisfy the raging masses, the authorities will quickly deal with those “caught” on camera by Anas. The question Kwabena kept asking himself was, how genuine and corruption free was Anas himself?
People were saying that after any exposé he would first show the clip to those he captured, and it will be a matter of “talk something good or I will have no option.” This reconciled a statement he allegedly made on air that he was not the type who goes cheap. So what was he selling, the truth, the massaged truth, or the untruth?
Kwabena had no hard core evidence, except to ask Anas what happened to the exposé on corruption or whatever within the chambers of the sixth Parliament of this Fourth Republic he promised to show to Ghanaians. And also why does he entrap his targets and lead them into sin, then turn round to point accusing figures at them? The example of the Hearts-Kotoko match given above was one case where the referee never went to solicit a bribe, but was approached by Anas, who had posed as a Hearts of Oak official, when he was not even a member of staff of the club.
That was entrapment, and what he did was wrong in the eyes of the law. No investigative journalist of repute would entrap his targets.
Now stories and video clips have been shown of a gentleman who looks like Anas deeply involved in contentious land grabbing, which could make very good stories for an Anas exposé on the wrongs in land acquisition in Ghana, had it not been that he was deeply involved in this one. Such an exposé would have educated most people who want to acquire land, and help them look out for scammers and make the right choices and decisions.
In all of the above stated, what disturbed Kwabena Amikaketo most was the fact that Anas Amereyaw Anas uses international platforms to expose the perceived wrongs going on this country. Kwabena was mad, because, this continues to dampen the image of his own country, making shady and crooked investors to choose to come here, since, with a few dollars, they would reap a thousand fold what they had invested, and the country will be the loser.
These countries are among the most corrupt in the world, but they manage that bad image and come out looking like saints. Take the United Kingdom for example, where Anas chose to use the BBC to broadcast corruption in Ghana to the world.
These developed countries are the first to classify countries like ours as high risk corrupt nations, meanwhile they will receive poor people’s monies from leaders of third world countries, and allow them to be deposited in bank accounts in the their countries. Such monies will then be given as loans to these same poorer countries.
There has never been the occasion where such receiver nations will withhold ill-gotten money brought into their banks by sitting heads of state. It is only when that African head of state exits power that these powerful countries will start making noises and attacking the image of fallen leader.
The last time Kwabena checked, the one who sells stolen goods and the one who receives them are both very corrupt criminals.
In some cases, the monies may be repatriated back to source, but when that even happens, it comes at a cost to the poorer nations, no meaningful interest will be accrued on the looted money all the time it was generating revenue for the banks.
The late Gen. Abacha of Nigeria was said to have illegally amassed billions of dollars of poor Nigerians’ money into accounts in Switzerland, the USA and some others. Abacha died in 1998, and it took over fifteen years before these developed nations started returning the loot. Meanwhile, the poor got poorer, and many in Nigeria suffered the harsh effects of lack of funds to meet essential demands.
Yes, it took over fifteen years to start returning the loot, something they could have done within the year Abacha died, Kwabena lamented. This is wickedness and corruption more so, as these rich and powerful nations used these stolen monies to give loans to the poor nations, the monies came from with unattractive conditions. In the end, while these powerful nations have interest rates from negative to 5%, the poorer countries have rates in the double digit, most averaging 35%. This is the corrupt countries our crusader against corruption, Anas Amereyaw Anas, desires to deal with.
Anas is always associating with the BBC and wants us to believe that the British were holy and clean. Well, a look at the Umaru Dikko’s affair will make people think differently. Dikko was Nigeria’s Transport Minister and head of the presidential task force on rice during the Shehu Shagari administration. The coup of 1983 saw him flee into exile and was domiciled in the UK. Back home, he was accused of large scale corruption and embezzling millions of dollars of oil revenue.
There was no way he could be brought home to face the charges levelled against him. So a way was devised to get him back to Nigeria, which is now known as the “Dikko Affair,” when a failed attempt was made to transport him as cargo on a Nigeria Airways Boeing 707 plane from UK’s Stansted Airport to Nigeria. This brought an impasse between the two countries, which went on to break the international relationship between them for two years.
Kwabena Amikaketo read a Wikipedia report which stated: “The Nigerian government’s war against the previous government’s corruption was also weakened, as the British government also rejected Nigerian requests to extradite other politicians wanted in Nigeria on corruption charges and living in exile in Britain.”
These are the people who portray poorer nations like Ghana as corrupt, yet they will thwart efforts made by us to fight corruption, while, at the same time, they will open their arms to receive ill-gotten wealth from the leaders of our nations. And it is one of these nations that Anas Amereyaw Anas is flirting with to sell out our country Ghana, Kwabena Amikaketo, lamented.
Kwabena has advice for Anas. The best way he could do his investigative journalism is to do his undercover work without entrapment; get the results, and hand over everything to the law enforcement agencies. No documentaries, no international broadcasting, but simple honest work, for the law to take over.
The BBC thing could be reaping in lots of hard money for him at the expense of the reputation of this country. No one said he should not fight crime, but he should not be a criminal before fighting one.
And those who get hyper-excited and hoot and jeer at the alleged culprits caught on camera, there is news for them. As Anas moves from sector to sector, apart from attempting to establish that Ghana is a completely corrupt nation, with very corrupt people except him, soon videos will be produced with some familiar faces known to those hurling insults and condemning others. Then when it gets close home, we shall all find ways of addressing this issue and dump the Anas Amereyaw method.
We cannot wash our dirty ntama in the village square of those whose ntama are dirtier, but choose to wash them indoors. What at all is Anas Amereyaw Anas telling the world about us, Kwabena Amikaketo lamented.
Hon Daniel Dugan
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect The Chronicle
The post The Memoirs and Lamentations of Kwabena Amikaketo (4) The Journalist who is Selling Out appeared first on The Chronicle Online.
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