Cheap talk destroying the fibre of our politics
Talk is very cheap in Ghana. Sometimes some people talk before they even think about what they have said. Many don’t even care what their cheap and loose talk is likely to do to other people or the nation.
The pain is that those who can stop such people don’t even care, because sometimes such cheap talk favours their political positions at the expense of their opponents.
In recent times, many of the talks on our political platforms have been very stinking and undeserving of the people from whose mouths such talks come. Disturbingly, such people are supposed to be role models for our youth and posterity because of the positions they occupy.
Not long ago, we heard foul exchanges between Kobby Acheampong, then Deputy Minister of the Interior, and the then General Secretary of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), Kwadwo Owusu Afriyie, from which the term ‘Kokooase Kuraseni’ came to be associated with Owusu Afriyie.
Once upon a time, Johnson Asiedu Nketia, the National Democratic Congress General Secretary, referred to 17 persons who had filed to contest the NPP flag-bearer position as ‘17 hardened thieves’ and went scot free.
In the same vein, now Minister of Agriculture, Fiifi Kwetey, boldly accused then President J. A. Kufuor of selling all the gold reserves of Ghana; an accusation he had to swallow but never fully apologised for when he faced the Parliament’s Appointments Committee during his vetting for a ministerial position.
On November 25, 2014, Daily Guide reported that the Ashanti Regional Chairman of the NPP, Bernard Antwi Boasiako, aka ‘Wontumi,’ was quoted as saying that he “will ensure the election of his favourites to steer the affairs of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) in the congress slated for December 13,” adding that he caused the change of the venue for the NDC elections from Sunyani to Kumasi.
“Only the NDC members who have my support will receive colossal votes from the party’s delegates at the congress grounds,” he told the paper in an interview. Is this not cheap and loose talk? Was it even politically wise for him to have made that statement, assuming that as an NPP member he has the privilege to select who wins leadership positions in the NDC?
The newly elected Central Regional Chairman of the NDC, Allotey Jacobs, who is also noted for cheap and loose talk, denigrated NDC sitting Member of Parliament, Emmanuel Aboagye Didieye, on a radio station, describing him as a ‘local boy’ without credentials and clout to contest his party’s national organiser position. Allotey needed to accord the man the respect he deserves as an MP; a position Allotey cannot achieve if he were to contest the Cape Coast seat.
Daniel Nii Kwartei Titus-Glover, NPP MP for Tema East, speaking on Adom FM on Monday, December 8, 2014, made a categorical statement that an Akufo-Addo presidency would investigate the circumstances surrounding the death of former President John Evans Atta Mills. Then a day later he had to backtrack to say it was his personal position. Did he consider the implications of his statement on his party and Nana Addo?
Another notorious loose talker of our times is Samuel George Nettey, a member of the NDC Communications Team. This young man could have built for himself a good political career, having had the opportunity to serve in his party and later in government at that young age. However, I believe he has allowed the positions to ‘swell his head’, causing him to talk the way he does.
When the Nayele Ametefe cocaine saga emerged, Nettey boldly told the world that Alhaji Dawood Mohammed, who is mentioned as being the one who facilitated the use of the VVIP lounge by Nayele, was the Business Development Manager of KELM Engineering Limited and an NPP financier, and that President Kufuor’s government gave KELM Engineering Limited a contract to construct the Jubilee House (Flagstaff House).
However, in a Daily Graphic report of December 1, 2014, the management of the company said KELM Engineering was established in 2009, when the Jubilee House had long been completed and Kufuor was no longer the President.
The company also said: “Alhaji Mohammed Alamid Dawood has ceased to be an employee of the company since June 2014.” So how can a government communications team member, who is supposed to have access to the needed information, pollute the minds of the public on sensitive issues connected to cocaine business?
In the ongoing campaign by NDC members who are seeking leadership positions in the party, a lot has been said against each other. Even the National Organiser, Yaw Boateng Gyan, is now suffering from an unguarded statement he made on radio about President Mills’s death.
Though he has since tried to back pedal, he has failed, as what he said was clear enough to let people understand what he meant. His statement was pregnant with so many innuendos pointing fingers at his own party members and colleagues and accusing them of having a hand in the death of the president.
Even President Rawlings cannot escape blame for such talks. One of his loose talks was his earlier categorical statement that Kufuor and his government killed the Ya Na. Thank God he retracted that statement this week.
Yes, talk is cheap, and everybody must be able to talk. But, what kind of talk must we engage in in public, especially by politicians and people who are supposed to be role models for society and posterity?
As we prepare towards the 2016 general elections, there is no doubt that we are going to hear a lot of such loose talk which, if not checked, could plunge this country into a situation we all do not want. In countries where violence have erupted, most of them started with loose talk.
Leadership of our political parties, the Clergy and our respected senior citizens, many of whom are highly regarded for their political neutral views, must begin to condemn anyone who henceforth talks loosely to unnecessarily inflame passions, which could lead to conflicts.
The author is a Political Scientist, and Media and Communication Expert. fasado@hotmail.com