Thursday, October 15, 2009

Breaking News: “Chop & Quench Democratic Party Formed!”

I am pleased to publicize the formation of the first true mammoth party in the fifty-two years history of Ghana. The Chop and Quench Democratic Party is set to take the country by storm, and we are on the cliff of history. For far too long, we (Ghanaians) have been too divided and complacent. The CQDP is designed to overcome these twin malaises.


The CQDP is the fulfillment of our founders dream; a clarification of our national principles, and above all the ultimate perch in our gigantic journey to matured democracy. Every generation has its heroes, and this generation will make heroes out of every CQDP member.


First, what is our modus operandi? Well, our intention is to unite all rogues, criminals, charlatans, never do wells and political apparatchiks across the political gamut under one entity.

Increasingly, we the corrupt (sorry well meaning) politicians of this country have been pursuing varied interests. We have fought for elections on the pretense of helping the people, and killed ourselves in the process. In the spirit if uhuru, CQDP is declaring an end to that. Henceforth, “sit-tightism” is abolished. Every criminal does a two year term, chops and quenches, and hands it over to the next! The era of sharing the national cake is over; the age of owning it free and clear for two years is here!


You might ask, what is our platform? Well, if you are not too dumb to realize it our mission is to chop and quench. That is, to chop your money and quench your spirit! By “your” of course I mean the electorates who have decided to remain outside the big umbrella of our union. Our platform is to ensure total state secrecy in budgeting, contract awards and implementation. We pledge to ensure maximum inefficiency at every turn, and hope to depreciate the standard of living of you the readers. Your air will not be safe, your taps will not run and even they do, the water will be dirty. Your roads will be deathtraps, and your hospitals shall become glorified mortuaries. Your electrical supply shall be epileptic, and your energy supply will run thin.


While you are at it, our party is pleased to announce that part of our founding membership is all Pastors, Bishops and Imams in Ghana. We even managed to buy the support of the ecclesiastical, which will confirm that we are truly leaving nothing to whims. Our motto is simple: lawless, useless and reckless. We will be lawless in our conduct, useless in our thinking and reckless in our spending. We pledge full allegiance to these core principles regardless of whose ox is gored!


Okay you are still too dumb to realize what is going on? No wonder you are not a CQDP member. Our members are the smartest and brightest con men that any nation can put together. Filled to brim with veteran examination cheats, and certificate mill patrons we are men that respect brawn over brains, and madness over meditation. For your information, we subscribe to the notion that liberals are sinners and conservatives are hypocrites hence we have every use for both ideology! In our camp we have primed human killing machines i.e. political thugs, and accredited financial weapons of mass destruction i.e. Ghana must go custodians.


If that still does not impress you, consider this: we have a track record. Our record of accomplishment is seven squared years of regression, and human development destruction. We have infested a continent with a cancer for lazy thinking, and abhorrent greed. We feast in excesses and celebrate the Lilliputians amongst us. Nothing fazes us anymore, in fact we routinely defend lawbreakers at home and abroad. Our party leaders are so blind justice, only ex-cons qualify for national party offices and important positions of reckoning.


In the interest of national stability we are declaring a “national chop free day”. On this day, every man or woman in our nation is allowed to “chop”. If you find anything, eat it! Cable, go ahead and eat it! If it is mat, eat it! If you see oil, please eat. Money, eat it. Even live goat, enjoy yourself. You’d be lucky to find anything after another forty nine years of our rule.

However, we are fully dedicated to the philosophy of eating and drinking. Common, our potbellies is a testimony to the ostentation of our appetite. Can’t you see our women? Their rotunda shaped body, and bell like shape creates chaos on the floor of the capital market such that the national GDP deflates in their presence!

Central to every political strategy is an identity; our party symbol and colors. Our party symbol is a locust. We are dedicated to plundering, and nothing better symbolizes this movement than this forthcoming arthropod makes no bones about its intention, and neither do we. Our mission is to do the impossible, to intentionally bankrupt the nation and render her citizens impoverished. Half a trillion, and still counting, we are only getting better at it. Our party color is black, because only our dark minds can fathom these great accomplishments.


In as much as your likes just read and turn the pages, the fate of our party is forever sealed. An arrogant association of never-do-wells that will continue to bestride your horizon like a colossus, while you forever regret the citizenship that birth has credited you.

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Police And Thief: The Ghanaian Identity Problem

Growing up in the 90s, a game was common. We played this game of Police and Thief. The bad guy of course was the thief. After much chasing and hiding, it was normal for the police to catch the thief or for the police to shoot and kill the thief. That was based on simple logic, the triumph of good over evil.


Even as kids it was very clear to us that evil must be quashed. Looking back into history, I can not really say how it went wrong, but definitely something went wrong.
The police and thief game shows the picture of how the larger society ought to be. The police in this piece are not limited to the men and women of the Ghana Police Service; rather it is Ghana as a state.


It encompasses all the institutions of the state and their various agents. It does talk about the machinery of government with due reference to those saddled with the responsibility of governing the country. It is both the elected and public officials, both civil and military. It talks about the security and law enforcement agencies in the country.

The dictionary defines a State as: a country's government and those government-controlled institutions that are responsible for its internal administration and its relationships with other countries. Or: a country or nation with its own sovereign independent government.
It goes further to define a government as a political authority: a group of people who have the power to make and enforce laws for a country or area. The state is therefore viewed as the ruler; the state and its administration are viewed as the ruling political power. A government thus assumes the mandate given by the people.


Since every one can not be law unto him/herself, the citizens surrender their power to a government who then has the authority to rule on their behalf. The legitimacy of any government is derived from the people and that is why popular participation mostly through free and fair elections seems to be the best form of coming into power.

It is only justifiable that after giving up their power to the state to rule with their mandate, the people of any country or nation will expect certain duties and responsibilities on the part of the rulers in exchange for the rights and privileges the rulers gain from occupying public offices.
These include but are not limited to the security of lives and property, provision of basic amenities and infrastructure, employment opportunities, social services, enabling atmosphere for businesses to thrive among other things.

In fact I can summarize the responsibilities of any meaningful government to; developing, sustaining and even improving the human development of the people by utilizing the resources at the disposal of the government.
Like a day which gives way to the setting of the sun, the situation here has become blurred. It is no more Police and thief but has over the years become a case of the Police is the thief. And for me this is the root of Ghana's Identity Crisis.


Ghanaians are a very religious people, yet violence and crime rates are very high. Ghana has enormous body of water but there is scarcity of water for human consumption and commercial use. The country has a vast array of arable land but majority of her people are starving. Ghana has many educated people who have excelled in all endeavors of life but our basic problems at home have not been solved. We have many sources of generating and distributing electricity but we exist perpetually in semi darkness and are the largest importer of generators in Africa. We import almost everything including tooth pick and cotton buds.


We spend huge funds and lives to ensure peace keeping and enforcement in warring countries but we can not keep simple law and order at home.
The state and her institutions, the government and her organs, the people, have all connived to ensure that Ghana does not become the pride she was destined to be. Ghana has been wandering between obscurity and oblivion. We have no meaningful identity to present to the world or even ourselves.

The state has failed in its primary role of harnessing the resources of the country to the benefit of the generality of the citizenry. Rather corruption has become so endemic that it has been elevated to become the official language of governance.
Corruption has become the fuel which burns the governed but cooks the food for the elite club who has hijacked power that is the cult.

Various governments have been hypocritical in fighting corruption. They only fight it with their lips but oil its wheel with deeds. We have school buildings but the standard of education has nose-dived.

We have health professionals but our hospitals have become an entrance to the grave, my cousin who completed the Nursing Training last year is contemplating leaving the shores of Ghana.
Sadly water ways are not available for our folks in the Afram Plains, rail system is out of service and our roads are death traps.

We have more streets than homes in this country, more churches than Christians and more mosques than Moslems. We have more crises than solutions, more rogues than patriots and more contracts than projects.

We destroy faster (this am guilty because of the work I do) than we build and do not maintain at all. We have a government but we are been compared to say Somalia which has been without a functional government since 1991. We talk so much about development but achieve nothing or at best so little.

Ghana is the only country where political parties campaign during elections without a manifesto. I say this because after winning power they forget their manifestoes and focus on different things.

Obviously it means the government has no ideology. Any government with out an ideology is a car without a driver. It can stop at any time in transit. It may skid off the road; it may summersault and may even drive itself into an ocean.

And that is exactly what is happening. Ghana has been driving on the road of insecurity, driving into the ocean of dehumanization with reckless impunity. We have no safety valve to gauge the volume of air in our tube. Meaning we may burst at anytime due to excess pressure or may go flat due to inadequate air.

Life expectancy in Ghana is at a lowly 50 years in a millennium where technology, research and development have used science to demystify most health related problems.
Given Ghana’s resources, abundant talents and the size of this country both in terms of population and land mass, Ghana ought to be what Malaysia is to the Asia continent, or what India is or what Brazil has become for Latin America. Unfortunately we keep falling on the scales of development indices.

The police and thief of the days gone beyond has become the police is thief. The state has not stood on the side of justice, equity, peace and development. The act of governance has become the route to exploitation.

The Ghana's identity problem calls for serious concern. If the police is now the thief, who will the victims run to for help? If the state is the bandit who will the citizens run to for reprieve? The police is the thief.

Yes, that is the crux of Ghana's identity problem.