Ghanaians Won’t Vote For A Northerner Again? Well, Bawumia Is A Heart-Beat Away From The Presidency

Trust Ghanaian politicians to make the most outrageous, insensitive and highly provocative statements you will ever hear. More often than not, the overriding calculus, the predominant reason, behind their utterances is the desperate craving to be noticed and to score political points.

So, here comes along this unknown quantity masquerading as a politician and goes by the name Kofi Akpaloo —the founder and leader of a tiny and insignificant political party that has since its inception been at the periphery of our political ecosystem —- having the unmitigated gall to say with a straight face that “Ghanaians won’t vote for a northerner again.”

Mr Akpaloo made the widely inaccurate claim on a radio show in the urban jungle of Accra during a discussion on the current behind the scene maneuvers in the NDC as to who among the party’s stalwarts is best suited to lead it into the 2020 general and presidential elections.

He based his analysis, which was neither scientific nor sourced, on the performance of the immediate past president, Mr. John Mahama.

Here is Mr. Akpaloo’s head-scratching statement: “John Mahama has caused a lot of damage to the integrity of the northern politician…they are very decent people but Mahama’s performance has killed their chances for the presidency.”

This assertion, I must submit, is patently false. What was shameful and mischievous about Mr Akpaloo’s utterance was his patronizing tone and condescending attitude towards northerners.

I did a double-take after perusing that awful statement; it was the most vile, ignorant and inconsiderate utterance coming as it is from an individual aspiring to be the leader of our dear nation. If individuals of Mr. Akpaloo’s ilk are permitted under our constitution to form political organizations to vie for the highest office in the land, then we are in for trouble.

Besides its enormous absurdity, Mr. Akpaloo’s flawed claim is also profoundly instructive which is that there are a few stubborn southern politicos who still harbor arcane and medieval views about northerners. Left to their own devices, these southern politicians would just as well banish northerners from the corridors of power.

Mr. Akpaloo should bow down his head in shame. His was a pitiful effort at ingratiating himself with the current wielder of power in the nation, the NPP. He reportedly pulled the same stunt with the NDC when it was in power. The take away, what one can infer from Mr. Akpaloo moves is this: he is an opportunist extraordinaire.

His crass and backward thinking has no place in modern Ghanaian society. What is more, his thoughts and ideas belong to the scrapheap of history and should be confined to the past where they rightly belong and when folks like Mr. Akpaloo held sway.

We have come a long way from the days when northerners were marginalized and relegated to the background; we have progressed from the time when people of northern extraction were shunned and kept away from the most prestigious jobs in the country.

Be that as it may, Mr. Akpaloo’s claim lacks merit and defies logic. His prognosis, if I can call it that, is severely flawed. He cannot definitely prove that Ghanaians are wary of northern politicians and won’t ever again trust them with the leadership of the country.

Apparently, Mr. Akpaloo did not get the memo: the vice president is a northerner, and he is a heart beat away from being the commander in chief.  And, you can take that to the bank, Mr. Akpaloo.