Mahama, count yourself lucky

I don’t do either Facebook or Twitter, else this rejoinder to the shameless tantrums-throwing Mr. John Dramani Mahama would have appeared on one of these two social media platforms. Still, it is quite understandable that the former President would be fuming and hopelessly thrashing about over what he cynically terms as the massive layoffs of Ghanaian citizens that his party and government, namely, the National Democratic Congress (NDC), jampacked onto our civil and public service boondoggle payroll in the waning days of Mr. Mahama’s tenure (See “Mahama Attacks NPP’s Unacceptable Dismissal of Workers” 3News.com / Ghanaweb.com 5/26/17).

His is a vacuous protest because it clearly appears that what the former President ought to be doing, right now, is to be explaining to Ghanaians why the basis of such layoffs by the Akufo-Addo-led government of the New Patriotic Party (NPP) is wrongheaded, not his rather grotesque and comical argument that every Ghanaian citizen has a constitutionally protected right to work. Indeed, if his argument were valid, the man who has publicly and imperiously stated that he feels legally entitled to being afforded two electoral terms of governance by the Ghanaian electorate, ought to be able to also explain to these very voters who roundly rejected him at the polls last December, precisely why under his tenure the rate of unemployment, at least per World Bank-IMF statistics, was decidedly upwards of 50-percent.

In other words, under Mr. Mahama’s tenure, the overwhelming majority of Ghanaians who had a right to be gainfully employed, going by his own logic, either by the public or private sector, were effectively rendered homeless. This goes to show you, the dear reader, exactly what sort of moral reprobate and a congenitally heartless man the former NDC-Member of Parliament for Bole-Bamboi, in the Northern Region, is. The man simply lacks nearly each and every one of the salient qualities that any great leader is expected to possess. And so why does the former Rawlings Communications Minister think that he can dictate labor and employment policies to President Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, short of his quite well-known and nauseating streak of overweening pride and arrogance?

The Akufo-Addo Flagstaff House says that the workers being currently laid off were illegally hired by former President Mahama and his cabinet associates for politically partisan reasons, and not on the basis of merit or evenhanded and competitive qualifications. And so what the democratically jackbooted former Chief Resident of the Flagstaff House ought to be telling the nation is precisely why he thinks his successor is taking the wrongful approach to public employment policies. Indeed, if he sincerely believes the laid-off workers were wrongfully terminated, Mr. Mahama could promptly petition a legitimately constituted court of the land to have the affected workers immediately reinstated and their grievances lawfully redressed. But we all know that this infamous scofflaw would rather spend his publicly-salaried time snooping on “corrupt” judges with Mr. Anas Aremeyaw Anas’ Tiger-Eye PI team, than let on his own Ford Expedition Payola Ways to the very people whose hard-earned taxpayer’s revenue he wants to be “democratically” allowed to fleece in perpetuity.

I, however, doubt very much that Mr. Mahama will pursue this legitimate and time-tested approach to justice, because this widely known and acknowledged heartless tribal, and ethno-regional, bigot knows in his heart of hearts that the laid-off workers were recklessly packed onto the public payroll to essentially sabotage the economic recovery program of the incoming Akufo-Addo Administration, once the human-piranha operatives of the Mahama-led National Democratic Congress’ regime got roundly rejected in last December’s poll. Indeed, Mr. Mahama ought to count himself lucky that the Akufo-Addo government has not already had him arraigned before a legitimately constituted court of the land, at least not just yet, to account for some of the politically motivated and reckless contractual and labor decisions he took in the twilight days of his administration.

In another era and another country, Parliament would have voted to strip Mr. Mahama of his presidential immunity and privileges and ensured that the Moscow-trained former communications or international relations operative was put behind bars and was awaiting trial for his legion capital crimes. The military fatigues-wearing former Commander-in-Chief of the Ghana Armed Forces knows darn pretty well that he has absolutely no legitimate case against the layoff policies of the forward-looking and politically progressive and visionary Akufo-Addo Administration, thus this lurid and cheap publicity-seeking stunt on Twitter and Facebook. The man is desperately seeking to make himself relevant on the national political scene, in hopes of fooling Ghanaian voters into affording him a highly unlikely nod to enable him to scam them once more. Fat chance!

By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., Ph.D.

English Department, SUNY-Nassau

Garden City, New York

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