THE magic hundred days in office by President John Evans Atta Mills is here. Under normal circumstances, we should be celebrating our gains, especially considering the pains we went through to maintain our stability and sanity as a people. But can we celebrate? Yes, but to a limited extent.
The first 100 days into Professor Mills’s four-year term, we are still vetting people for ministerial appointments: A process that has in the main veered from its objective of assessing the suitability of nominees to manage state affairs in their respective ministries, to become an inquisition, more or less an extension of the acrimony and mudslinging we witnessed on the campaign platforms during Election 2008.
Though it is not easy to forget some of the things political opponents said during the campaign period, more so, when some of those things had serious bearings on the electoral fortunes of some political parties; many Ghanaians were of the opinion that the earlier we buried the campaign miseries behind us, the better for our national equilibrium.
By all means, people should not be allowed to escape with careless and irresponsible statements. However, an obsession with the past will also not augur well for national development.
In fact, if we have to always recall all the things that were said or done in the name of politics by all the political parties very few will have the peace to have a full night’s sleep.
The posture of certain Members of Parliament on the Appointments Committee, while it may seem to be an exercise in setting the records straight, is not only raking over old wounds but also dragging government business unduly. At the end of the day, it only offers an excuse for another set of people to exact their pound of flesh when the opportunity offers itself.
What is, however, more worrying is the way we have used the first 100 days of a new government not to confront national challenges, but to fight over who takes what in the previous administration.
One would have thought that, having gone through a gruelling transition in 2,001, which left us with a lot of scars, we would conduct ourselves better this time. But the accusations and suspicions will not just go away.
First, we engaged in unnecessary and senseless debate over what should be the appropriate ex gratia to be paid to the former President and other high public office-holders captured under Article 71 of the 1992 Constitution.
It is true the recommendations captured by the Chinnery-Hesse Report did not reflect this country’s status as a beggar nation, the majority of whose children continue to squat and take lessons under trees. It also made it seem as if the presidency is a battlefield, where an ex-president, like a conqueror, must go home with spoils of war.
While the world’s rich and powerful nations were meeting in London to map out strategies to overcome the global recession that is eating into their economies, we have spent more than three months haggling over acquisition of state properties as if that is the end of the world.
After that, we shall go back to those nations, with cup in hand, begging for their support for our national budget. While we condemn government agents for their impatience and unorthodox manner of retrieving state vehicles from previous ministers and other public office-holders, we equally condemn those former public officers who know they must not take away what does not belong to them.
For instance, do we always have to justify bad behaviour by taking refuge in the past? If something was not good yesterday and was condemned, should we repeat it and justify it in the present?
In 2000, former President Rawlings was alleged to have vacated the Osu Castle with a large fleet of state vehicles. Very few applauded that action and as was expected, they included some fanatics who would not see anything wrong with their idol.
Can we proudly say we have learnt lessons from the past and improved upon our performance, when former President Kufuor, after eight years, also decided to select his own state vehicles that he must retire with? No matter what some may think, the answer is a big NO!
What was not justifiable yesterday cannot be justifiable today. State property remains state property and nobody should be seen to be disregarding this basic fact, and more significantly a former President should be the last person to be making light of this.
The most honourable thing former President Kufuor should have done was retire peacefully to his residence and await the response of the new President. It is then that we can determine whether he had been treated fairly and honourably or not.
But to take the first step of making your own selection undermines one’s integrity and jeopardises national unity. It gives room for people who are prone to mischief to have a field day, just as we are witnessing in the country now.
As could be seen, the discussion on the matter has taken a partisan twist, which does not augur well for a more dispassionate approach to arrive at a national consensus for future and permanent application.
The same can be said about the choice of a state bungalow by former President Kufuor for his office. It is the duty of the new President to honour the previous President by allocating him a suitable place for an office, which must be appropriately furnished and equipped at state expense.
The new President stands accused if he fails to do that. The Presidency should be treated with dignity and not reduced to property-grabbing enterprise.
The former Speaker of Parliament, Mr Begyina Sekyi-Hughes, swept his official residence clean when he was vacating. What could be the excuse? And who is trying to defend this?
I hate to hear those who make reference to what happened in 2000 or before, to justify the bad things of today. Why do we yearn for a change, if we were pleased with what happened yesterday or are happening today? So what is change, if it only means different people repeating the same thing?
We must grow out of the iniquities of the past. We must know the things that are good for us as a people and pursue them with all determination and stop the merry-go-round business.
Public service should remain public business and those who offer themselves to serve should do so in humility and in similar vein accept whatever is due them with gratitude. State properties should not be treated like spoils of war that must be raped and plundered by invading armies and their generals.
fokofi@yahoo.co.uk
kofiakordor.blogspot.com
No comments:
Post a Comment