One person who needs to read this very carefully is Professor George B.N. Ayittey. ?An Email To Nana Akyea Mensah – The Odikro, By Kofi Thompson?, drew my attention to the article under review. The e-mail read, in part, ?Comrade, just read your article entitled, “The NPP Does Not Even Have A Prima Facie Case!”. Brilliant. Well done! Take a look at Professor George B.N. Ayittey’s Ghanaweb article entitled: “President Obama?s Shadow on Ghana?s Elections”. Note the subtle attempt at influencing the judiciary by raking up the unfortunate past? Expect others to take the cue. This Supreme Court case is not really about “deepening Ghanaian democracy”. That phrase is deliberately deployed to give respectability to a selfish agenda, by clever individuals pursuing a political scorched-earth strategy. It guarantees them the following, of the decent-minded middle-class innocents-abroad in our midst, who actually care about Ghanaian democracy. Pity. As an acquaintance of mine insists: “Kofi, there is definitely a plan afoot to destabilise Ghana, by some of the people around Nana Akufo-Addo”.
by Nana Akyea Mensah, The Odikro.
The reason why it is important not to ignore comments like that is because, if we must learn from the experience of the Ivory Coast and Libya, it is the changing of the political narrative and the subtle twisting of events and meaningless propaganda slants, that did the trick for the war-mongers. These are people who are regularly offering themselves to be interviewed by the mass media on what is going on in Ghana, even though they remain profoundly and dangerously ignorant of what they are talking about. In ?President Obama?s Shadow on Ghana?s Elections ?, Feature Article of Friday, 4 January 2013, by George B.N. Ayittey, the writer who describes himself as ?a native of Ghana and president of the Free Africa Foundation based in Washington… ? states: ?The inauguration ceremony is premature and should be postponed until the Supreme Court makes a ruling ? for or against the petition.? He argues further that:
?Rushing with the inauguration of President John Mahama on Jan 7 is NOT the proper way of doing things when a petition is before the Supreme Court (SC). This is not about the merits of the petition; it is the SC which must decide that. We must all wait for the SC to render that decision. Installing a new president BEFORE the SC makes a ruling has troubling implications and sets a dangerous precedent:
1. It shows utter disrespect and contempt for the Supreme Court. It is the government saying the SC can go to hell and it does not care about what the SC will say. It is going ahead anyway with its plans to inaugurate the new president. This is dangerous because if the government has such contempt for an institution, why should any other body respect it? ALL, including the President, must respect the Supreme Court and the Constitution.
Charging ahead with the inauguration when the issue is before the SC is extremely provocative. We have told the people to be patient and allow the court process to proceed. Why inflame the situation? Why should the people continue to be patient when the government is not prepared to be patient? We have a situation where some people are following the Constitution whilst others show no inclination to do so ? like some people driving on the right while others drive on the right. Catastrophe is inevitable.
3. Such an action puts the Chief Justice in an awkward situation. She cannot swear in a new president while at the same time the SC is evaluating the validity of his election. That makes no sense. What if the SC rules that Nana Akufo-Addo indeed won the elections? Are we going to have Nana Akufo-Addo inaugurated and installed as the President too and end up with two presidents ? just like Ivory Coast in Nov 2010 ? and add more confusion? Why can?t we wait for the SC to make a final ruling? What difference would it make to Ghana as a nation if a new president is installed in June, instead of January??[1]
In the first place, I find the ease with which a President of a group that calls itself ?Free Africa Foundation? transposes our specific transitional blues with that of the United States of America, without any references to our constitution and laws but ?what the U.S. Supreme Court did in the Florida dispute in 2000. It sent the case back for a recount; it did not do the recounting itself. And while the recount was going on, everything ? including the inauguration of President Bush ? was placed on hold.? Unfortunately for the writer, the Ghanaian public is even more informed than him. The issue of the new transitional law was discussed widely in radio and television, as well as in print. Every serious commentator on Ghana knows that the Parliament of Ghana passed the Presidential Transition Bill into law. And that it was unanimously endorsed by both sides of the House on Friday 16 March 20012, and has since received Presidential assent.
?The new law was initiated by the Institute of Economic Affair? and the Ghana Political Parties Programme, an inter-party consultative group involving the four political parties with representation in Parliament ( National Democratic Congress (NDC), New Patriotic Party (NPP), People’s National Convention (PNC) and Convention People’s Party (CPP).) The new law is expected to curtail conflicts related to handing over power from one political party to another.? [2]
An important component of the law stipulates a built-in trigger mechanism, which sets in motion the transitional process:
?The law places an obligation on the team to meet within 48 hours of the declaration of the results of the Presidential elections and the Winner of the elections with subsequent meetings being convened by the co-chairpersons. The bill establishes three subcommittees namely Inauguration, Government Machinery and the Presidency sub committees. The inauguration subcommittee is to be responsible for the organization of the inauguration of the President-elect into office and for the taking of the oaths of office before parliament on January 7.? [3]
?
The Electoral Commission has a constitutional mandate, in Article 45 section (c), ?to conduct and supervise all public elections and referenda?. And Article 63 of the Constitution also states, (9) ?An instrument which (a) is executed under the hand of the Chairman of the Electoral Commission and under the seal of the Commission; and (b) states that the person named in the instrument was declared elected as the President of Ghana at the election of the President, shall be Prima facie evidence that the person named was so elected.? [4]
This is what automatically sets into motion, the transitional process. The constitution framers were aware of the possibility of disputes, but they deliberately framed the constitution in such a way that the litigation does not hold the nation back. In Article 64, it is stated in black and white that,
?(1)The validity of the election of the President may be challenged only by a citizen of Ghana who may present a petition for the purpose to the Supreme Court within twenty-one days after the declaration of the result of the election in respect of which the petition is presented.
(2)A declaration by the Supreme Court that the election of the President is not valid shall be without prejudice to anything done by the President before the declaration.
(3)The Rules of Court Committee shall, by constitutional instrument, make rules of court for the practice and procedure for petitions to the Supreme Court challenging the election of a President.? [5]
Our constitution thus envisages the situation in which we find ourselves and makes ample provisions to that effect, allowing the process to run parallel, and not ?what the U.S. Supreme Court did in the Florida dispute in 2000? where ?everything ? including the inauguration of President Bush ? was placed on hold.? Apart from attempting to throw dust into the eyes of the reader and projecting the bogus challenge to the results by the NPP, the article only attacks the current constitutional order as an illegality. Even the leading lawyers of the NPP agree and understand that their petition to the Supreme Court is “without prejudice” to the smooth functioning of state institutions. The same constitution requires the Electoral Commissioner to declare and gazette the results. The Constitution and the laws of Ghana set specific dates and time-table for the transition process. No law has been breached in the inauguration of the President. Indeed, contrary to the unlearned suggestions of Mr. Ayittey, it would be a breach of the law to post-pone the inauguration simply because of a challenge by “a citizen of Ghana”!
As the General Secretary of the NDC, Mr. Johnson Aseidu Nketia once remarked, “in a democracy, any idiot can go to the court”, and it would be unfair to the people of Ghana to hold the smooth running of state institutions to ransom simply because an idiot or two are not satisfied with one thing or the other! It is silly on the part of Mr. Ayittey to ask Ghanaians to follow what Americans did with their dispute over Gore and Bush. The reason is because we are following a different constitution! Our democracy insulates the smooth running of our state institutions from frivolous legal challenges! The level of social illiteracy displayed in Mr. Ayittey’s article, tells me that it will be in his own interest to learn a little bit more about our constitution and the strict transition protocols in place before passing uninformed and prejudicial comments.
The meticulous manner in which the transition is being handled vis-?-vis the laws of Ghana came up when the Public Affairs Director of Parliament, Mr Jones Kugblenu, told XYZ News on Thursday, 27 December 2012 that the Public Affairs Directorate of Parliament has brought the conflict between the Transition Act and the 1992 Constitution concerning the inauguration of the new Legislature to the attention of the Attorney General for a remedy to be fashioned out before January 3. The problem was that in order to maintain the legality of the transition, there was a need for the amendment of the new Transition Act to correct a conflict between one of its provisions and that of the 1992 Constitution, otherwise the new Parliament could not be inaugurated. Explaining the conflict, Mr Kugblenu described it as a challenge which Parliament was trying to overcome before the inauguration was due.
?The Transition Act indicates that the new parliament should be inaugurated 2 days before the 7th [of January]. The [1992] Constitution also states that the first meeting of the new parliament should see the election of deputy Speakers and that should take place after dissolution,? he stated. He said the lawyers are examining the conflict to ensure that there are no constitutional bottlenecks before the inauguration can go ahead, adding ?we’ve asked the Attorney General to look at it and advice the clerk who will chair the first meeting accordingly… As soon as we able to thrash these things out, maybe the law could be amended between now and the 3rd [of January 2013].? He stressed that parliament does not want to do engage in any illegal procedures that contradict the Constitution of Ghana. [6]
The very fact that the opposition NPP newspapers such as the Daily Guide, copiously take the time to explain this, shows that the writer of the article is even more bankrupt of ideas than the NPP itself. The Daily Guide writes under, Big fight in NDC over posts, General News of Monday, 7 January 2013:
?there was initial confusion regarding the period for the dissolution of the Fifth Parliament and the inauguration of the Sixth Parliament due to some inconsistencies in a provision in the Presidential (Transition) Act, 2012 (Act 845), speaks volumes to the meticulous attention to the law by all involved in the transition process. Section 11 (1) of the Act provides that the Clerk of Parliament summons a meeting of the elected members of parliament two days before the dissolution of Parliament to elect the Speaker, deputy speakers and take the oaths of office as members. Section 11 (3) of the Act provides that ?The Speaker elected under sub-section (1) and the Members of Parliament who take their oaths of office under that sub-section, assume office subject to the operations of Article 113 of the Constitution, and accordingly take office on the 7th January following the general election.? However, both sections of Act 845 are inconsistent with provisions of the 1992 Constitution. Article 113 (2) states that Parliament shall continue for four years from the date of its first sitting and shall stand dissolved, which indicated that the Fifth Parliament stands dissolved on January 6, 2013, considering that its first sitting was on January 7, 2009. Article 95 (1) of the Constitution stipulates: ?There shall be a Speaker of Parliament who shall be elected by the Members of Parliament from among persons who are Members of Parliament or who are qualified to be elected as Members of Parliament.?? [7]
The entire constitutionality of the Inauguration was re-affirmed by no less a person than the former president John Agyekum Kufuor, who insisted he was attending the inauguration ceremony of president-elect John Dramani Mahama because he is a statesman, ?I have been invited as a former leader of the country so I will attend… The Chief Justice will swear the president on Monday with Justices of the supreme court. Are we then saying that because they swore the president in, they have prejudged the court case? No, because they are doing the work of the nation and so will I. So people should leave me alone?. He admonished the NPP to focus on the court issue because what the court says is final and not the swearing in ceremony. ?The illegality of President Mahama?s victory is not the swearing in but what the court will say so all must exercise restraints?.? [8]
Thus the NPP’s boycott of the inaugural ceremony is a slap of the constitutional order and the rules of peaceful transition agreed upon by all. Their presence or otherwise does not affect their case in court. The only political impact of their boycott is is to naively believe that they can affect the constitutional order at will. It is a mark of a sore-loser to attempt to sabotage the winner, and this is what the NPP’s boycott amounted to, even though in the end, it failed to remove an iota of legitimacy from the duly inaugurated President. Even though defending the decision of the NPP to boycott ceremony, the Vice Chairman of the NPP, Fred Oware, has stressed that the actions of the NPP were not to sabotage the president but to seek justice and fairness in the just ended election, the presence of all the Justices of the Supreme Court, the former President John Agyekum Kufuor, and dignitaries from across the world. He made the comments on Metro TVs Good Morning Ghana programme on Monday, 7 January 2013. He said ?in this matter, the final arbiter is the Supreme Court. It?s not the Electoral Commission? So let us pat everyone at the back and let us say that listen under the leadership of Nana Akufo-Addo, in spite of the difficulties we are having, we?ve decided that we will go by the legal means.?
On the contrary, attending the inauguration would have helped highlighting the NPP’s resolve to go by legal means rather than the path of boycotts and the insurgency they are suspected of breeding because of their ?all die be die? and ?kill this and that? slogans! It is for this reason alone that the words of the Vice Chairman of the NPP, Fred Oware sound hollow indeed! He was also quoted as saying, ?the party is not going to support anyone who decides to be riotous over the matter but that they will ensure supporters abide by the rule of law.? As his co-panelist, Nana Ato Dadzie, a former Chief of Staff, to Mr. Oware, ?The NPP could have attended the ceremony and pursued its case in court. The NPP is not doing Ghanaians a favour by allowing the inauguration ceremony of the president to take place. This is a constitutional obligation. All of us as a people have gone to a referendum; we?ve agreed on the framework within which this country must be run,? he said. [9]
It is therefore clearly mischievous and irresponsible on the part of Professor George Ayittey to run a spin seeking to glorify the NPP’s petition over and above Ghana’s constitutional order. He writes, ?Our fate or prospects as a country depends upon allowing our institutions to work independently and doing what they are supposed to do. That?s what good governance is all about and ?Development depends on good governance? said President Obama on July 11, 2009. We are doomed as a country if we allow the executive to interfere with our institutions and prevent them from doing what they are supposed to do. Political and democratic maturity dictates that we should allow the SC to make a ruling before rushing ahead to install a new president. It is not John Mahama or Nana Akufo-Addo who will save Ghana but our collective responsibility to follow the Constitution. It is a duty we owe to our children and also a powerful message to send to the rest of Africa.?
It remains my hope that Professor George B.N. Ayittey will not commit such a grievous mistake of attributing any semblance of respectability to the NPP’s petition, as we move forward. It will be an unbearable insult to the intelligence of the reader, to be reading these types of jaundiced propaganda again and again, as this case progresses in court, and even more critically, afterwards. It was he himself that once said, ‘There is a popular saying: “The wise learn from the mistakes of others, while fools repeat them. But idiots repeat their own stupid mistakes.”‘ [10] Because the call on Ghanaians to postpone the inauguration of the President because of frivolous petition by the NPP at the Supreme Court is an insult to our Constitution, to all Ghanaians, and to the rule of law and the establishment of ?strong institutions? that he seems to be enamoured with.
And even what is worse, he casts insinuations about the murder of the three High Court judges, whilst at the same time, calling for the prosecution of the Electoral Commissioner, should the Supreme Court return a verdict of fraud. The article savagely attacks and pre-judges only in favour of the NPP and never casts a single doubt about their claims nor the consequences thereof, if the claims are found to be frivolous and vexatious by the courts. Under a more appropriate title: The People?s Shadow on Ghana?s Elections! Feature Article, by Nana Akyea Mensah, The Odikro, I shall be dealing with the supplementary issues raised in that article, particularly as regards the issue of building strong institutions vis-?-vis the petition by the NPP.
To quote my acquaintance again: “An Email To Nana Akyea Mensah – The Odikro, By Kofi Thompson. This Supreme Court case is not really about “deepening Ghanaian democracy”. That phrase is deliberately deployed to give respectability to a selfish agenda, by clever individuals pursuing a political scorched-earth strategy. It guarantees them the following, of the decent-minded middle-class innocents-abroad in our midst, who actually care about Ghanaian democracy. Pity. As an acquaintance of mine insists: “Kofi, there is definitely a plan afoot to destabilise Ghana, by some of the people around Nana Akufo-Addo”. Their dream of lording it over Ghanaians by riding on the coattails of Nana Addo having been shattered, those incompetents are now deploying a refined version of the December 2008 Atta Akyea/Malik Yakubu Alhassan plan, to exploit the legal system to achieve their dubious ends.
One only hopes that the NDC sees through this devious plot against Ghana, by these tiresome and arrogant incompetents”. Amen. Nana Addo himself isn’t bad, Opanin. Its the arrogant and selfish lot around him who are the problem. And some of them are his blood-relations, alas. Wish he would reverse out of this political cul de sac – and take the High Road to Mandela-type statesmanship, by conceding defeat. It would definitely earn him a place in the Pantheon of great Ghanaians. One hopes, for Mother Ghana’s sake, that in the end these “false” (to quote the principled Electoral Commissioner Dr. Afari-Djan) claims are thrown out by the Supreme Court. If only the wise and patriotic J. B. Da Rocha were alive to call them to order – and put an end to their nation-wrecking brinkmanship. Poor gentleman’s probably turning in his grave. Hmm, Ghana – eyeasem o!
Forward Ever! Backwards Never!
For Life, the Environment, and Social Justice!
Nana Akyea Mensah, Ghana Steering Committee,
P-AI, Social Media Campaigns | January 7, 2013
[email protected]
Pan-Africanist International – a grammar of Pan-Africanism and its manners of articulation!
www.panafricanistinternational.org
REFERENCES:
[1] President Obama?s Shadow on Ghana?s Elections | Feature Article of Friday, 4 January 2013, George B.N. Ayittey, http://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/features/artikel.php?ID=261139&comment=8732389#com
[2] Parliament Passes Presidential Transition Bill, Saturday, 17 March 2012 08:45, Ghana Government Portal. http://www.ghana.gov.gh/index.php/component/content/article/96-top-headlines/11699-parliament-passes-presidential-transition-bill
[3] Ghana?s New Presidential Transition Law, Jeorge Wilson KINGSON http://www.thecorporateguardian.com/main.php?articleID=234
[4] Constitution of the Fourth Republic of Ghana: http://www.judicial.gov.gh/constitution/home.htm
[5] ibid: http://www.judicial.gov.gh/constitution/home.htm
[6] Legal Discrepancy Puts Inauguration Of New Parliament In Limbo, By RADIO XYZ ONLINE, 28 December 2012, http://www.modernghana.com/news/437397/1/legal-discrepancy-puts-inauguration-of-new-parliam.html
[7] Big fight in NDC over posts, General News of Monday, 7 January 2013, Source: Daily Guide: http://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/NewsArchive/artikel.php?ID=261449
[8] Attending Mahama?s inauguration is not a stab in NPP’s back ? Kufuor, From: Ghana/AsempaFM/Twum-Barima, Published On: January 4, 2013, 17:15 GMT http://politics.myjoyonline.com/pages/news/201301/99461.php
[9] NPP is not sabotaging President Mahama – Oware, General News of Monday, 7 January 2013, Source: radioxyzonline.com, http://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/NewsArchive/artikel.php?ID=261436&comment=0#com
[10] Zimbabwe Among States Set to Implode, Written by George Ayittey, Monday, 12 November 2012? http://www.changezimbabwe.com/index.php/blog-mainmenu-9/1-latest/4362-zimbabwe-among-countries-set-to-implode
