Features
Parliament: When Bagbin decides to tell a ‘red’ lie
Many Ghanaians strongly believe that the Rt. Honourable Speaker of Parliament, Mr Alban Sumana Kingsford Bagbin, is not a robot and can never act as one.
Many also believe that Rt. Honourable Bagbin will not allow himself to be ‘programmed’ as autopilot or ‘a human post office’ where ‘people’ will post their ‘letters’ for him to read to compromise his venerable position as the Speaker of Ghana’s Parliament.
A lot of Ghanaians also hold the view that Rt. Honourable Bagbin is now ‘a national human property’ for all Ghanaians not only for his political party, the National Democratic Congress.
But latest development in the recent visitation of the Ethiopian Parliamentary delegation to Ghana seems to be erasing the lofty assertions made by a number of Ghanaians about our Rt. Honourable Speaker of Parliament.
One may ask: What is the beef?
The Speaker of Parliament in a recent interaction with a delegation from the Ethiopian Parliament is reported to have said; “but for last minute movements where some parliamentary seats were snatched by the New Patriotic Party (NPP) , the NDC would have had Majority in Parliament.”
Reportedly, Rt. Honourable Bagbin said:”The NPP General Secretary, John Boadu, even admitted that the NDC won more seats in Parliament, but some last-minute moves were made to snatch some of the seats from the NDC.”
Rt. Honourable Bagbin reportedly added:”That one is a statement of fact.”
Expectedly, the NPP General Secretary has described the claim by Rt. Honourable Bagbin that parliamentary majority went in favour of the Opposition NDC as “falsehood.”
“There is no iota of truth in such statement made by Rt. Honourable Bagbin to the Ethiopian Parliament since I have never stated anywhere that the NPP devised tactics to get parliamentary majority in its favour,” John Boadu has said.
He insists that ; “the NPP has always maintained in its post elections comment that the party won majority of the parliamentary seats.”
But the question is: Has Mr Bagbin himself got water-tight evidence to back what he allegedly told the Ethiopian Parliamentary delegation?
Assuming the NPP General Secretary said exactly what Mr Speaker is quoting him to have said; does it make his statement true? Where is the evidence to justify that the so-called statement made by the NPP General Secretary is nothing but the truth?
Readers, do you remember? While waiting for the declaration of the December 7, 2020 election results, former President John Dramani Mahama said at a press conference in Accra that:”We have won the elections. We have also won 140 parliamentary seats and what else do we expect?”
He stressed:” I am happy Ghanaians have rejected the Akufo-Addo government,” and asked his NDC supporters to take to the streets and jubilate.
Additionally, former President Mahama stated:”The Akufo-Addo government is using the military to change the results of the elections to favour Akufo-Addo and his NPP.”
So, Rt. Honourable Bagbin: From what former President Mahama is quoted to have said; be said to be true? Where is the evidence to back it? Is it because the statement is coming from ex-President Mahama, it must be accepted as the ‘gospel’ truth?
Rt. Honourable Bagbin: You are known as a very competent lawyer. Not so? In the ‘ game of law, ‘ is it not the case that EVIDENCE is supreme? So, where is the evidence that what you told the Ethiopian Parliamentary delegation actually happened?
If you cannot produce the evidence, is it not the case that you told a ‘red’ lie to the Ethiopian delegation?
And after the declaration of the presidential results, Mr Mahama and the NDC roundly rejected the results, claiming that the will of the people had been subverted and that “the proper verdict of the people had been stolen.”
Rt. Honourable Bagbin: So, did you believe; and do you still believe the statement above? If you believe the statement to be true; is it because it is coming from ex-President Mahama and the NDC? And do you have any evidence to support such a statement?
Mr Speaker: In spite of the ‘apparent truth’ you believed in ; was it not strange to you when ex-President Mahama went to Supreme Court, rather seeking injunction, directing the Electoral Commission to conduct another election between him and President Akufo-Addo ?
And that President Akufo Addo did not cross the constitutional threshold of 50 per cent plus one, to warrant the declaration of the presidential election results in his favour?
Mr Speaker: Were you surprised that the “stolen verdict” chorus; “the government using the military to change the election results”; and “the Electoral Commission attempting to change the election results to favour Akufo-Addo”; all evaporated from ex-President Mahama’s petition to the Supreme Court?
The simple answer is ; ex-President Mahama did not have any evidence anywhere to support his ’emotional’ statements.
Rt. Honourable Bagbin: Since you decided to follow “the ‘red‘ lie tangent”, you might have, as well, relayed the ’emotional’ statements made by your party to the Ethiopian delegation and topped it up with the Supreme Court ruling.
From a distance, Mr Speaker, I can tell with all the confidence at my command, that your reasoning prowess is more than excellent. So, why do you descend into the ‘red’ lie zone?
Readers, now let’s listen to Professor Edward Gyampo of the University of Ghana: “Bagbin is expected to be very firm and neutral person who will not even do the bidding of his own party and he sounded that caution.
“And if he begins to make such statements not backed by evidence, you open yourself up for needless criticisms.”
Professor Gyampo says: “They went to court. If they had that evidence, they should have shown this there. These things have been settled because we have handled them in court by the ruling.
“For a whole Speaker to be saying this; I mean, it’s a bit problematic because if you do that, it undermines the expected neutrality.”
Over to you, Rt. Honourable Alban Sumana Kingsford Bagbin. Any response?
Contact email/WhatsApp of author:
asmahfrankg@gmail.com (0505556179)
By G Frank Asmah
Features
Tears of Ghanaman, home and abroad
The typical native of Sikaman is by nature a hospitable creature, a social animal with a big heart, a soul full of the milk of earthly goodness, and a spirit too loving for its own comfort.
Ghanaman hosts a foreign pal and he spends a fortune to make him very happy and comfortable-good food, clean booze, excellent accommodation and a woman for the night.
Sometimes the pal leaves without saying a “thank you but Ghanaman is not offended. He’d host another idiot even more splendidly. His nature is warm, his spirit benevolent. That is the typical Ghanaian and no wonder that many African-Americans say, “If you haven’t visited Ghana. Then you’ve not come to Africa.
You can even enter the country without a passport and a visa and you’ll be welcomed with a pot of palm wine.
If Ghanaman wants to go abroad, especially to an European country or the United States, it is often after an ordeal.
He has to doze in a queue at dawn at the embassy for days and if he is lucky to get through to being interviewed, he is confronted by someone who claims he or she has the power of discerning truth from lie.
In short Ghanaman must undergo a lie-detector test and has to answer questions that are either nonsensical or have no relevance to the trip at hand. When Joseph Kwame Korkorti wanted a visa to an European country, the attache studied Korkorti’s nose for a while and pronounced judgment.
“The way I see you, you won’t return to Ghana if I allow you to go. Korkorti nearly dislocated her jaw; Kwasiasem akwaakwa. In any case what had Korkorti’s nose got to do with the trip?
If Ghanaman, after several attempts, manages to get the visa and lands in the whiteman’s land, he is seen as another monkey uptown, a new arrival of a degenerate ape coming to invade civilized society. He is sneered at, mocked at and avoided like a plague. Some landlords abroad will not hire their rooms to blacks because they feel their presence in itself is bad business.
When a Sikaman publisher landed overseas and was riding in a public bus, an urchin who had the impudence and notoriety of a dead cockroach told his colleagues he was sure the black man had a tail which he was hiding in his pair of trousers. He didn’t end there. He said he was in fact going to pull out the tail for everyone to see.
True to his word he went and put his hand into the backside of the bewildered publisher, intent on grabbing his imaginary tail and pulling it out. It took a lot of patience on the part of the publisher to avert murder. He practically pinned the white miscreant on the floor by the neck and only let go when others intervene. Next time too…
The way we treat our foreign guests in comparison with the way they treat us is polar contrasting-two disparate extremes, one totally incomparable to the other. They hound us for immigration papers, deport us for overstaying and skinheads either target homes to perpetrate mayhem or attack black immigrants to gratify their racial madness
When these same people come here we accept them even more hospitably than our own kin. They enter without visas, overstay, impregnate our women and run away.
About half of foreigners in this country do not have valid resident permits and was not a bother until recently when fire was put under the buttocks of the Immigration Service
In fact, until recently I never knew Sikaman had an Immigration Service. The problem is that although their staff look resplendent in their green outfit, you never really see them anywhere. You’d think they are hidden from the public eye.
The first time I saw a group of them walking somewhere, I nearly mistook them for some sixth-form going to the library. Their ladies are pretty though.
So after all, Sikaman has an Immigration Service which I hear is now alert 24 hours a day tracking down illegal aliens and making sure they bound the exit via Kotoka International. A pat on their shoulder.
I am glad the Interior Ministry has also realised that the country has been too slack about who goes out or comes into Sikaman.
Now the Ministry has warned foreigners not to take the country’s commitment to its obligations under the various conditions as a sign of weakness or a source for the abuse of her hospitality.
“Ghana will not tolerate any such abuse,” Nii Okaija Adamafio, the Interior Minister said, baring his teeth and twitching his little moustache. He was inaugurating the Ghana Refugee and Immigration Service Boards.
He said some foreigners come in as tourists, investors, consultants, skilled workers or refugees. Others come as ‘charlatans, adventurers or plain criminals. “
Yes, there are many criminals among them. Our courts have tried a good number of them for fraud and misconduct.
It is time we welcome only those who would come and invest or tour and go back peacefully and not those whose criminal intentions are well-hidden but get exposed in due course of time.
This article was first published on Saturday March 14, 1998
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Features
Decisions have consequences
In this world, it is always important to recognise that every action or decision taken, has consequences.
It can result in something good or bad, depending on the quality of the decision, that is, the factors that were taken into account in the decision making.
The problem with a bad decision is that, in some instances, there is no opportunity to correct the result even though you have regretted the decision, which resulted in the unpleasant outcome.
This is what a friend of mine refers to as having regretted an unregretable regret. After church last Sunday, I was watching a programme on TV and a young lady was sharing with the host, how a bad decision she took, had affected her life immensely and adversely.
She narrated how she met a Caucasian and she got married to him. The white man arranged for her to join him after the marriage and processes were initiated for her to join her husband in UK. It took a while for the requisite documentation to be procured and during this period, she took a decision that has haunted her till date.
According to her narration, she met a man, a Ghanaian, who she started dating, even though she was a married woman.
After a while her documents were ready and so she left to join her husband abroad without breaking off the unholy relationship with the man from Ghana.
After she got to UK, this man from Ghana, kept pressuring her to leave the white man and return to him in Ghana. The white man at some point became a bit suspicious and asked about who she has been talking on the phone with for long spells, and she lied to him that it was her cousin.
Then comes the shocker. After the man from Ghana had sweet talked her continuously for a while, she decided to leave her husband and return to Ghana after only three weeks abroad.
She said, she asked the guy to swear to her that he would take care of both her and her mother and the guy swore to take good care of her and her mother as well as rent a 3-bedroom flat for her. She then took the decision to leave her husband and return to Ghana.
She told her mum that she was returning to Ghana to marry the guy in Ghana. According to her, her mother vigorously disagreed with her decision and wept.
She further added that her mum told her brother and they told her that they were going to tell her husband about her intentions.
According to her, she threatened that if they called her husband to inform him, then she would commit suicide, an idea given to her by the boyfriend in Ghana.
Her mum and brother afraid of what she might do, agreed not to tell her husband. She then told her husband that she was returning to Ghana to attend her Grandmother’s funeral.
The husband could not understand why she wanted to go back to Ghana after only three weeks stay so she had to lie that in their tradition, grandchildren are required to be present when the grandmother dies and is to be buried.
She returned to Ghana; the flat turns into a chamber and hall accommodation, the promise to take care of her mother does not materialise and generally she ends up furnishing the accommodation herself. All the promises given her by her boyfriend, turned out to be just mere words.
A phone the husband gave her, she left behind in UK out of guilty conscience knowing she was never coming back to UK.
Through that phone and social media, the husband found out about his boyfriend and that was the end of her marriage.
Meanwhile, things have gone awry here in Ghana and she had regretted and at a point in her narration, was trying desperately to hold back tears. Decisions indeed have consequences.
NB: ‘CHANGE KOTOKA INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT TO KOFI BAAKO INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT’
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