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16.10.2012 Feature Article

ARE WE GOING TO REWRITE HISTORY BECAUSE RAWLINGS HAS CHOSEN TO SPEAK AGAINST CORRUPTION IN THE NDC?

ARE WE GOING TO REWRITE HISTORY BECAUSE RAWLINGS  HAS CHOSEN TO SPEAK AGAINST CORRUPTION IN THE NDC?
16.10.2012 LISTEN

I wish to author my shortest article ever. I have been following debates on the social networks with people raising questions about the legacy of the man Jerry John Rawlings and casting all forms of insinuations because the man has chosen to speak against corruption in the party he founded, the National Democratic Congress.

To those who are in doubt, without mincing words or going verbose, these historic moments cannot be wished away in our annals, and they are as follows:

1. He came as a military ruler in 1979, relinquished power same year.

2. He came back in 1981 and ushered the country into a democracy in 1992.

3. In 2000, he spearheaded a transfer of power from one government to another peacefully, a prototype event on the continent of Africa.

What then is legacy when he had all the opportunities under the sun to go the way of Mugabe, especially at 50 which is just the starting age for most African politicians?

Those three events set him apart from the rest we have seen on the continent and elsewhere. Those were indeed landmark events. We can continue to look at the contents of those eras and give him his place in history - Ghanaian returnees from Nigeria, expansion of tertiary education, placing Ghana back on the path of economic growth, and many more achievements. Would keeping quiet and watching the rot to continue in the party he founded to be a better legacy? History cannot be altered in this case. Some impute that silence is golden. But I posit that silence is never golden when there are unanswered questions. Let's continue to ask questions and seek solutions to our problems. Jerry Rawlings has woken the NDC up to a rudest shock and that in itself is another legacy historians would consider when they come to put the pieces together.

Let's ask intelligible questions!!!
Prosper Yao Tsikata
[email protected]

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