Features
Monsieur’s daughter —(Part 3)
Things were falling in place for Simon Ababio, at long last. He graduated with a degree in biology, and started off with high hopes. He got a job with a research organisation near Koforidua, where his family had settled some twenty years earlier.
He was granted study leave with pay to do a post-graduate course in plant research in the US. He managed to complete it, with great difficulty, but he decided to get a job and put some money in his pocket before returning to Ghana. More than three years later, he had virtually no money to show for his time in the US.
His employers had terminated his employment, and his sweetheart Gladys had informed him that she had entered a relationship with someone else, because for three years he had not bothered to communicate with her.
On his father’s advice, he came back home and, after pleading with his employers, was reinstated. He tracked Gladys down to Aboso. Initially she was quite unpleasant, pointing it out that she was happily married and no longer interested in an affair with a loser.
Quite stung, he persisted, bombarding her with nice stories about how things were looking up after the initial difficulties. He was going back to the US to pack up and return to Ghana. Even though she was married, he would never forget her, and he would fight to get her back. For those sweet words, he was rewarded with some unforgettable nights in a hotel.
He surfaced again some months later, assuring her that he had returned to his job with a big promotion, and pleaded with Gladys to join him. She spent another few days with him at the hotel for the thrill, but she was never going to leave David for him. Simon simply talked too much, and you could never be sure where you stood with him.
But only a few days later, Gladys chased him down to Koforidua, and made a package of demands, threats and promises. First, she informed him that her husband had gotten to know about their relationship, and their marriage was over.
Of course, she blamed Simon for the situation. And since he had been making all kinds of promises, this was the time to fulfil them. She was ready to come and settle with him. She didn’t really believe his sweet words. She knew he hadn’t made much of his life, but she was willing to support him to become a real man.
All he needed to do was stand up and make a decent effort to achieve something. She was offering him all those on one condition. He would claim Sarah as his baby, because she had made that very declaration to David.
After only one moment’s hesitation, he accepted the entire package. Gladys was of course, good looking, resourceful and intelligent. She would take care of all his needs. He didn’t have to worry about food, nor deal with those money-grabbing girls anymore.
He bribed a few relatives to perform the traditional rites, and Gladys moved to Koforidua, where she secured a job as caterer in a technical school. Simon, his new wife Gladys and their baby Sarah started life as a family.
David settled well into the Master’s Degree programme at the University of Hamburg. The seaport city offered many opportunities and attractions to a multilingual student like him.
He started lectures early and closed at one each day. After lunch at the university cafeteria, he rode the bus to the huge harbour, where numerous jobs were on offer. He did two jobs each day, one with a shipping company, and another with a company that exported trucks and heavy duty equipment. He closed at six-thirty, grabbed supper on the way home and, by nine, was comfortably tucked in bed.
He was in great demand due to his ability to speak English, German and French. He was earning good money, and life was hectic but comfortable. But he began to get lonely, especially during weekends when he preferred to work only a few hours. One evening, he wrote a short email to Adoma.
‘Dear Adoma, I hope you are doing well. I am sorry it has taken me so long to write to you. Life has been very busy since I got here. I start lectures quite early, and work in the afternoon. I get home by eight and I am asleep before nine. I can’t believe one year has already gone.
So how is everyone at Aboso? I remember the good days, but I try not to dwell on them, in order not to get homesick. I am grateful for the opportunity to have served in the school.
So what have you been up to? I would like to hear from you regularly, if you don’t mind. Remember you said you have forgiven me my sins, and that we are friends. Please don’t forget to tell me about the naughty things you have been doing. I look forward to hearing from you’.
Adoma was very surprised when David’s name popped up on her phone during morning assembly. Delighted, she slid out to the staff common room and read it. She mentally wrote the reply several times, but she waited till after closing before she keyed in these words:
‘David, it is really good to hear from you. I thought you had forgotten all about me. Many thanks for the thought. I am doing well. My life hasn’t changed much since you left town. The school is doing well. I’m sure you won’t be surprised to learn that you are still well remembered. We won’t forget you for a long time.
I’m afraid I haven’t been able to do any naughty things yet. The closest I got was to have gone out to lunch with a guy at church who had politely told me that he was interested. During the lunch I thanked him for the attention, and told him that I was already in a relationship. Sorry to disappoint you!
Yes, David, I have forgiven you. Now that you have raised the topic again, perhaps I can tell you this. I really cared about you. I was very confident that in the near future you would realise that and ‘raise your game’, having already told me that you wanted us to be seeing each other. Unfortunately, I didn’t notice the other lady coming at you with blinding force and speed. So now you have it. I will certainly like us to keep in touch. One thing, though. Perhaps you should be kind enough to alert me about the presence of ‘opposition forces’. David replied that evening.
‘Adoma, thanks for your reply, which I have read many times. First of all, can you please make sure that no intruder invites you to breakfast or lunch ever again? Secondly, I wish I had learnt about how much you cared for me. For me, that is the main ingredient in a successful relationship. I won’t repeat the mistake. Okay, now I want to hear from you very regularly. I would like to raise my game. I hope to see you in the near future’.
From then, things moved at steady speed, and after the performance of the customary rites, Adoma spent three months with David, a pattern which continued for the five years that he stayed in Germany.
By Ekow de Heer
Features
The Cop, press and lost fingers
The job of a policeman, whether he is short or tall, is not a cheap one. He is supposed to keep the peace, protect society and monitor the activities of local magicians and money doublers who are specialists in making civil servants lose their pay within seconds.
By far the most difficult job of the policeman is when he is expected to arrest a murderer who is not only armed but also has a record of appearing and disappearing at will. Even if the tough cop is in the company of other policemen all armed to the teeth, his stomach will turn to water when the criminal suddenly appears.
He is terrified not because the criminal is a better marksman, but because nobody dies twice. The problem also is that a criminal might be prepared to die in a bid to shoot his way to freedom. But is the police-man prepared to risk death in the course of duty when he has a family to rear.
If he had just acquired a new girlfriend with whom he is enjoying life, should he not run away with his tail between his legs and tell his boss that the criminal is uncatchable?
Before some policemen go on patrol duties, they actually pray solemnly. “God send me into the wilderness and bring me back safely with my nose intact because I’m worth more than a common rat. I also do not want to die like a stray dog. If a bullet is targeted at my forehead, Holy Spirit please let it go over the bar, because six children is not a small palaver. If I die, who will look after them? Lord keep me safe day by day. Amen!”
The Sikaman policeman’s job is a risky one because he is not properly equipped with even a trained dog to help track down criminals easily. So he has to use his own nose judiciously in sniffing out suspects while making sure a bullet doesn’t catch him square on the jaw.
My friend Sir Kofi Owuo, a.k.a. Death-By-Poverty was telling me journalists are in an even riskier profession. Apparently, he had been reading about the palaver of journalists in places like Algeria and Columbia. Algeria, even women journalists are not spared assassin’s bullet. You’d see them lying in front of their homes with their heads full of bullet holes.
In Columbia, no journalist is safe. When a journalist is leaving home, he has to tell his wife. “Darling, when I don’t come back by 7 p.m. check the mortuary
The drug trade in Columbia has made journalism a profession not worth practising. If you write on cocaine and the harm it is inflicting on society, you’ll certainly receive a phone call.
“Hello, Mr Journalist, your article yesterday was great. Congratulations! We never knew you were such brilliant writer, championing the cause of society. Again we say congrats! But you know something, by your article, you want to take the bread out of my and that of my family. You don’t want us to beak. We are aggrieved beyond measure”
“Oh, I was just… “You’d try to say something
“You don’t have to explain. The harm has already been done by your award-winning masterpiece. We have an appointment with you. You’ll hear from us.
Rest In Peace!” After such a phone call, you just have to pray to your soul, sing a hymn or two and get prepared fort appointment with death. For, death will surely come
I think pressmen in Sikaman would also have start informing their families appropriately before leaving for work now. “If I don’t come back early, I’m probably at the Ear, Nose and Throat Department of Korle- Bu checking a leakage in my left ear due to a gendarme slap from an AMA official. If you don’t see me there, track me down to the emergency ward. If you see a newly-made cripple, I’m the one”
What about referees? These days they are guarded during football matches so that the risk they bear in terms of lost teeth is minimal. Formerly, it used to be a job full of woes and tribulations.
You were expected to oversee a match in such way that would favour a particular team. If that is not done, you’ll get back home and your wife will not recognise you. She’ll mistake you for Frank Bruno who had just lost a bout. When she finally recognises you, she’ll fix some hot water to massage your poor face.
I hear that these days, apart from the protection referees receive, some are well-armed with Damfo Dzai, a kind of jack-knife that can carve a rowdy supporters face in several designs.
My Press Secretary and part-time bodyguard Devine Ankamah, was telling me if he happens to be a referee, he’d surely carry a Kalashnikov AK 47 rifle with him, complete with loaded magazine, before officiating matches. According to him, that is the only way to do the job without fear or favour. Anyone dares will lose his jaw.
Anyway, risky jobs require good remuneration. As Kwame Korkorti once said, risky jobs require risky salary. A policeman would require a good pay so that when a criminal targets his left ear it would be worth the ‘amputation’. Same for journalists and cameramen.
But go round private workplaces and factories and you’d see really risky occupations where workers are receiving salaries they can’t see with the naked eye.
In fact, in some private workplaces, environmental safety is completely absent. Workers breathe in fumes, poisonous gases and risk lung and respiratory problems. Their employers do nothing about protecting them against these hazards. Check out their payer.
In other places, workers have their fingers chopped off on the job, some losing as many as four fingers in stretch. The compensation they get can best be described as “wicked”. Their employers live big, chop big, ride big but are not willing to pay more than ¢120,000 for lost fingers.
Actually the more fingers you lose, the more money you get. So if you intend losing your fingers on the job, it is advisable to lose as many as possible so that you can get more cash. Those who have lost one finger have not benefited much and are encouraged to lose more next time around.
Sikaman Palava is undertaking to investigate some of these cases of very risky jobs in private setups and companies where workers are being exploited to unnecessarily but not offered protection against health hazards, and not properly compensated when they sustain injuries.
This article was first published on Saturday, September 28, 1996
Features
Position yourself for God’s blessings
Motivated by the impending 40-day fasting and needless to add prayer programme, preceding the Greater Works Conference scheduled for August in Accra, I would like to draw attention to how believers can receive blessings from God.
There is a scripture in Hebrews 11:5 that “By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death; and was not found, because God had translated him: and before his translation, he had this testimony that he pleased God”.
This clearly shows that in order to receive blessings from God, you must please God. How can one please God? You can only please God by obeying him and walking in line with God’s word. Just like how children who obey their parents, enjoy special treatment, so does God deal with his children who obey his word.
There are ways by which people receive blessings from God and holiness is an important criteria in the whole equation. Holiness is a process and not a one day event.
It is a mindset borne out of walking in obedience to God’s instructions i.e. his word. In order to have a mindset of living to please God, requires studying God’s word coupled with praying and fasting.
This helps us to develop trust in God by knowing his nature, what he likes and dislikes. This is what will enable us to live to please him and for our faith in him also to increase.
The Bible says in Hebrews 11:6 that “But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him”
Fasting is one of the required criteria for blessings to be released and it goes with prayer because fasting without prayer is just a physical exercise. Fasting enables a person’s inner man to be in tune with the spirit of God and also becomes spiritually empowered to hear from God and also obey God.
Fasting enables a person’s spirit to feed on God’s word in a much more focused manner as compared to studying God’s word in normal times. As a result our spirit gains the upper hand to dominate the body and the soul, so that we are more conscious of the presence of God in our lives which causes us willingly the desire to live to obey God.
Holiness which is a prerequisite for pleasing God, can only manifest in our lives if we are able to overcome the desires of the flesh and this only happens when the flesh is subject to the spirit.
Apostle Paul said that “But l keep under my body, and bring it into subjection: lest that by any means when I have preached to others, I myself should not be castaway”, according to 1 Corinthians 9:27.
In order to bring the body or flesh into subjection so that believers will be able to live to please God, we have to study, God’s word in a certain state of mind which fasting and prayer appropriately provides.
Our minds are the battle grounds for decisions that either please God or the Devil. In order to please God so his blessings can be released upon our lives, we must continuously engage our minds with thoughts that is in line with God’s word.
Philippians 4:8 says that “Finally Brethren whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue and if there be any praise, think on these things”. May God help us to live to please him by meditating on things that please the Lord, so we shall be blessed in all aspects of our lives. God bless.
NB: ‘CHANGE KOTOKA INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT TO KOFI BAAKO INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT’
By Laud Kissi-Mensah
