President Akufo Addo Vrs Former President Mahama On Incorruptible
There is an adage that fish starts to rot from its head, and once the head begins to rot, then certainly no part of the body will be spared. This statement gives credence to the fact that leadership is at the heart of everything, and so, where leaders are themselves deficient, then failure is bound to happen. It is also said, rightly so, that, corruption is the biggest bane of this country which is militating against our forward match. Much as corruption, no matter who is involved, is condemnable and indeed a criminal act, it is worse where the leader himself proves to be the corrupt person.
This has brought to the fore the need to subject persons aspiring to be our leaders to the vigorous test of incorruptibility, as the surest way of ensuring that we don’t elect persons who are so susceptible to corruption. It is on the basis of this that I am inviting you, my fellow countrymen and women, to consider the corruptibility or otherwise of the two leading presidential candidates, i.e. Candidate Akufo-Addo and John Mahama, in deciding who to vote for when they go to the polls on Monday, December 7.
With President Akufo-Addo, we all do know that he is arguably the only Ghanaian political leader who, throughout his over 50 years of public life, has never been accused or alleged to have been involved in any act of corruption. He is therefore on record, as the only leader, to have boldly proclaimed that: "I, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, am not corrupt; I have never been corrupt and I shall demand same of all my appointees".
And indeed, for all the corruption allegations leveled against his appointees by surrogates of the NDC, President Akufo-Addo had ensured that they were all thoroughly investigated even if they were frivolous. And where the allegations have strong basis, he never hesitated in cracking the whip. That is a mark of an incorruptible leader.
The NDC had tried desperately without success to associate President Akufo-Addo with corruption. Their recent attempt on this exercise where they manufactured a doctored tape at their $20 million party headquarters, seeking to associate the President with corruption, has become the biggest joke in town.
Unlike President Akufo-Addo, candidate John Mahama cannot and has not been able to make any bold statement to tout his incorruptibility because of his personal involvement in a lot of the corruption scandals that plagued his administration.
Here, mention can be made of the Ford Expedition scandal where John Mahama took a bribe involving a Ford Expedition from a Burkinabe contractor in exchange for juicy road contracts; the Amajaro bribery scandal, where a leaked document from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office of UK indicted John Mahama, the then sitting vice president as the recipient of bribe money from Amajaro in order for him to influence the lifting of a ban placed on them; and the issue with the 5 Brazilian aircraft scandal among several others.
John Mahama proved to be so corrupt that during his time as Vice President, his boss, Late President Mills had cause to set up a committee to investigate the role played by him (John Mahama) in the processes leading to the Acquisition of Five Aircrafts (5) including Embraer 190 Aircraft and hanger for the Ghana Armed Forces. The committee included Mr. William Aboah, Mr. George Amoah, and Brig. Gen. Allotey (Rtd) former Judge Advocate-General. Mention can also be made of John Mahama’s personal involvement in the botched $10billion STX Korea housing deal, the $600million Queiroz bribery scandal, the $13million E.O Group bribery scandal and many others.
Of course, the latest in the series of corrupt cases where John Mahama was directly involved is the Airbus scandal where he (John Mahama) has clearly been identified as Government Official One, who had been indicted in this biggest international bribery scandal ever seen in this world. The courts in three different countries (France, UK and USA) indicted this Government Official One (John Mahama), for using his brother, Samuel Adam Mahama, as conduit for receiving £ 3million bribe money from Airbus to influence the purchase of some military aircrafts.
It is thus not surprising to Ghanaians that candidate John Mahama was not bold enough to answer a question he was asked on BBC by Peter Okwoche on whether or not he had ever taken a bride. John Mahama’s guilty consciousness will just not permit him to answer this question straightforward. And so, John Mahama needed to ask the BBC presenter to clarify whether he was referring to him, John Mahama, as a human being or John Mahama as a President.
In the final analysis, the inevitable conclusion that can be drawn from the Ghanaian reality is that, when we talk about corruption under the administration of President Akufo-Addo, we point accusing fingers at his appointees and not him. However, when we talk about corruption under the administration of John Mahama, we don’t only talk about his appointees but we also talk about he, himself. Indeed, he has proven to be even more corrupt than his appointees, and has been personally involved in more than 50% of the corruption scandals under his administration.
Let us vote wisely if we really and sincerely care about the future of our country.
<<Print>>