The man whose membership of the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) is stoking fire among the rank and file of the party, Major Kojo Boakye Djan (rtd), does not want to fall for what appears to be a vicious and unsubstantiated allegation being peddled against Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, New Patriotic Party (NPP) presidential candidate by some NDC propagandists.
Boakye Djan said he knew Nana Akufo-Addo at the University of Ghana but never saw him abusing drugs. Key and influential NDC members including Deputy Information Minster Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, Deputy Interior Minister Kobby Acheampong and Felix Kwakye Ofosu, a member of the NDC communication team, have often sought to discredit the NPP flagbearer as unfit for the high office of President as he is a drug addict.
They have challenged Nana Akufo-Addo to a medical test to extricate himself of the drug tag. But Boakye Djan, who happened to be a mate of Akufo-Addo at the university in the 1960s, told Asempa FM on Monday that Nana Addo was not a drug user.
He confirmed what former President John Kufuor said about the NPP presidential candidate that �I never saw him do it, honestly. He wasn�t the type; the person I knew.� Major Boakye Djan said he had always felt bad when some of his own colleagues in the NDC made these sweeping allegations since they destroy the essence and beauty of the game of politics. He identified incumbent President Mills, Dr. Kwadwo Afari-Gyan, Chairman of the Electoral Commission, second deputy Speaker of Parliament, Prof. Mike Oquaye and Finance Minister, Dr. Kwabena Duffuor as some of their university mates.
Though they had both gone their ways for that long and led separate lives, he noted, �Taking the drugs is not something I saw. He might have done it later I don�t know�, jokingly saying, �In any case, as I mentioned, Clinton was able to admit that he handled the stuff but did not inhale it.�
In spite of that, Boakye Djan stated, �that didn�t make him a bad or worse President of America�, thereby diffusing the argument of the likes of Kwakye Ofosu and Kobby Acheampong that Akufo-Addo would not be an efficient President if he was indeed pushing narcotic drugs.
�Assuming without admitting that he handled it, I am saying that there is a precedent; that is Clinton will go down to be one of the greatest American post war Presidents,� Boakye Djan emphasized.
According to him, �Even if he accepted it, it didn�t affect his performance as President,� expressing total confidence in Akufo-Addo�s ability to lead Ghana as a nation. For this reason, the former military capo and spokesman for the then Armed Forces Revolutionary Council noted that if the person (Nana Akufo-Addo) put his hand on the chest and denied the allegation, the nation should believe him and forge ahead.
Source: Charles Takyi-Boadu/Daily Guide
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