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TAKE JOHN MAHAMA’S NAME OUT AND THE NPP WOULD BE LEFT WITH NO CAMPAIGN MESSAGE
It is increasingly becoming clear that the New Patriotic Party has no tangible campaign message for this year’s election. Everything about their campaign this year is about John Dramani Mahama, the flag bearer of the National Democratic Congress. A Party in government for eight years has nothing to campaign on except mounting unfounded attacks on John Mahama.
This was evident in a press conference addressed by a supposed campaign team of Dr Bawumia. After watching and listening to what those political hangers-on did yesterday; if Dr Bawumia is happy with their work, then I am afraid he may not stop nodding uncontrollably soon.
Of all the red herring things said at the press conference yesterday, two things caught my attention. The first one, which I have already addressed in an earlier write up, was Salam Mustapha’s unintelligent claim that Mr Mahama contradicted himself when he said that he would separate Youth from Sports Ministry. According to him, this separation would automatically increase the number of Ministers when Mr Mahama had said he would reduced the number of ministers. He even added that sports is vital to youth development and that there would be no need to separate the two ministries.
I have already explained that Mr Mahama has made it clear that when given opportunity, he would do away with certain ministries and merge some. In fact, two days before Salam addressed the press, Mr Mahama himself made a categorical statement that he would collapse the sanitation ministry when given opportunity to serve this country. If Salam had not been lousy with his political approach and had elevated his level of reasoning a bit, he would have asked those who wrote the speech for him to read to expunge that part from the statement.
Like the teasing ‘simpa panyin’ Salam was only handed a speech to go and read without subjecting the content to any reasoning. If he did, he would have again realized that Mr Mahama never said he would scrap the Sports Ministry but said he would separate it when given opportunity. This ‘move’ would create avenue for a more focused and dedicated time to looking at Sports as one aspect of youth development and also Youth Development in general as another aspect instead of lumping them together like we presently have and focusing on only soccer.
But I can understand Salam, he wanted to be heard and he has been heard. He has achieved his aim and that alone is enough for him. Whether what he said made sense or not, he is least bothered. He has something to throw his weight about with in the media and get applauds from his few NPP cheerleaders.
The second thing that caught my attention was the already deflated NPP propaganda which was rehashed again by Miracles Aboagye that when Mr Mahama is elected, he would collapse or cancel free SHS. The Party’s tough propagandists started this campaign against Mr Mahama but had to abandon it because Ghanaians made nonsense of it. It is no longer a potent weapon for a Latter Day Saint like Miracles Aboagye to latch on to advance his noisy antics in the name of communication.
There was a reason why Ghanaians rejected that propaganda against John Mahama. Beyond the fact that a man who has invested heavily in educational infrastructure cannot be averse to free SHS, nobody can cancel or collapse free SHS. Point is, free SHS was not a novel campaign message introduced by the NPP. It is constitutionally guaranteed and provided for. Its full scale implementation was what the NPP did after the NDC under John Mahama started with it with day students.
What we must all know is that free SHS is an entrenched provision in the constitution. For it to be cancelled, the constitution must be amended through a referendum. What this simply means is that free SHS can only be cancelled or collapsed if overwhelming majority of Ghanaians go to the polls to vote that it should be cancelled. No single person, be it the President, can cancel or collapse Free SHS.
It is surprising that after NPP propagandists had realized this and backed off on this line of campaign against Mr Mahama, it has now become a new found love for Mircales Aboagye. The more he talks about this, the more he embarrasses himself and exposes his limited understanding of the constitutional backing that free SHS has.
A press conference by a Party in government should not be reduced to name calling concert where John Mahama’s name became the chorus on the lips of everybody. Where are the achievements of Akufo Addo and Bawumia that these guys cannot trumpet them? A press conference of a Party in government would only be reduced to this when there is nothing reasonable to tell Ghanaians.
We beg Miracle Aboagye and Salam, the youth of Ghana are reeling under severe hardship occassioned by Dr Bawumia and Akufo Addo’s mismanagement of the economy, if they have nothing useful to tell them, they should save them this old fashioned rejected tales about Mr Mahama. The Bawumia presidential dream has sunk so deep that nothing can save it.
By Amos Blessing Amorse
Regional Youth Organizer
Greater Accra
abamorse@st.ug.edu.gh
