Oftentimes I wonder if President Nana Akuffo Addo is really in the know about things that go on in his administration.
Why do I ask? Because Mr. Addo seems to have this uncanny knack of saying things that are at odds with and contradict what his appointees say or do.
All of which leads me to believe that there is a profound disconnect between Mr. Addo and his underlings.
My assumption therefore is that Mr. Addo lives in a bubble; he is oblivious to what goes on around him as his appointees transact business on his blindside.
Take his statement last week at a forum in New Jersey in the United States as a prime example of Mr. Addo’s disconnect from the everyday affairs of his government.
At the forum, Mr. Addo told the audience in an answer to a question posed by a Ghanaian that he explicitly disagreed with the deportation of the Chinese businesswoman, Aisha Huang by his own government.
And, ironically, he waited for months to come out and tell the world he was not in sync with the decision taken by a branch of his own government. Isn’t that something?
By admitting that his government has goofed, Mr. Addo invariably, created the unfortunate impression that he was kept in the dark by his officials or he deliberately ignored the issue out of political expediency.
There is no doubt that the Aisha Huang case was a major issue with national implications. The issue was the poster child for galamsey, illicit gold mining venture that has brought in its wake serious environmental problems.
Not surprisingly, it was frontpage news all over the media for a variety of reasons. For one, it involved the destruction of our pristine environment by some unscrupulous foreigners, mainly Chinese.
For another, it laid bare the impunity that foreign investors enjoy in our country with the active connivance of government officials who will move heaven and earth to protect anyone claiming to be a foreign investor.
Until her arrest and eventual repatriation, Aisha Huang had wreaked havoc on our otherwise pristine environment by polluting our rivers, degrading our forests and endangering the health of rural dwellers.
Yet, in spite of her glaring crimes, Ms. Huang was allowed to operate at will because some high ups in government believed that protecting her was all in the national interest.
Remember what Senior Minister, Osafo Marfo said three months ago about the deportation of Ms. Huang? Mr. Marfo had the audacity, the sheer nerve to tell Ghanaians not to bite the hand that feeds them.
“China is giving us billions of dollars in aid so we should not do things that will offend them,” Mr. Marfo boldly and shamelessly stated.
Given all of what has transpired since the deportation, it is a major distraction and a carefully calibrated political maneuver that Mr. Addo would express regrets about the deportation of Ms. Huang.
He seems to imply that she instead should have been put through the legal process and if found guilty sent to jail.
But one question that immediately comes to mind is thus: Is Mr. Addo being truthful to Ghanaians? He is the President, after all, and no decision of this magnitude and implications could have been taken without his input or knowledge.
Additionally, Mr. Addo could have easily stopped the deportation of Ms. Huang if he really wanted to. All he had to do was order the proper state agencies to stop the deportation and begin the prosecution of Ms. Huang. But he did absolutely nothing.
Mr. Addo’s statement in New Jersey was therefore a copout and blatant. It was designed, for all intents and purposes, to mislead and confuse Ghanaians.
In all honesty, Mr. Addo elected to remain silent about Aisha’s deportation until now for one paramount reason — like his senior minister, he did not want to offend his Chinese benefactors.
Somebody should tell Mr Addo that Ghanaians are not thick in the head, stupid. He is taking them for a ride and they damn sure know it.
Comments are closed, but trackbacks and pingbacks are open.