How Many Excuses, Asiedu Nketia?—NPP-USA Women’s Wing

“He who knows not, and knows not that he knows not, is a fool,” so goes an ancient Chinese saying. A lot of words have been used to point out Asiedu Nketia's foolishness in wearing his wife's winter coat as part of a supposedly high-powered presidential delegation on a state visit to Germany. However, the man who coined the expression “Kwasea bi nti” (Because of a fool) to mock a legal opponent who was court-ordered to pay a hefty fine to him (Asiedu Nketia) has shown himself to be the most ignorant fool in a government of many fools.

The guy, who happens to be the General Secretary of the ruling party, wore a woman's coat to a meeting with the Chancellor of Germany, who happens to be a woman. Asiedu Nketia gleefully posed for the cameras of the international media, totally oblivious to his sartorial goof. And nobody on the entire presidential protocol team saw or knew enough to point out the colossal blunder to him, apparently because they were all equally ignorant.

The whole saga would probably have been allowed to die a natural death after its initial exposure, if not for the fact that it has very serious implications not only for the man's own state of mental and emotional health, but also the state of Ghana's current governance and international image. Ever since his attention was drawn to his obvious gaffe, Asiedu Nketia has given a litany of excuses for his action, each of which is more ridiculous than the last one. In a media video clip that has come to our attention, Asiedu Nketia, with his propagandist mentality, falls over himself with obvious contradictions, disingenuous verbal acrobatics, ludicrous 6facetiousness, and outright lies, all in a frantic attempt at damage control, by dismissing as inconsequential the global embarrassment he has caused us all. He thought Ghanaians would be gullible enough to swallow his chicanery, as he usually expects them to.

Within the span of 2 minutes in the video, Asiedu Nketia admits “borrowing” the coat from his wife, but claims that

1. The coat is unisex. There are both obvious and subtle ways to tell a man's coat from a woman's, including checking for the brand, which side it buttons, and how it is cut and tailored. You can usually tell just by looking at it, and trying it on.

2. He does not have money (he is poor), and does not spend money on needless things (he is not extravagant). He had money to pay cash for his mansion in Canada, and he does not have money to buy a men's coat? Looking at that coat, it is quite obvious it is not even cheap.

3. He did not need a new coat for only 2 days' stay in Germany. Then in the same breath, he says he has been traveling with that coat all over the world – “Denmark, UK, China… any time [he] is traveling to cold places.” What a contradiction!

4. He went to Germany for “brain work” not a “fashion show.” Does he mean to say his own colleagues and all the other people who wore the appropriate attire were engaged in a fashion show? Plus if he did not have the little brain power needed to distinguish between a man's and a woman's coat, where was he going to find the brain power needed to negotiate deals and woo foreign investors to Ghana? Would they even take our national representatives seriously?

Additionally, Okudzeto Ablakwa, the equally clueless deputy Minister for Education, waded into the controversy by giving the childish excuse that Asiedu Nketia showed his unknown “romantic side” by wearing his wife's clothes! The earlier Okudzeto Ablakwa and his ilk are dismissed the better! As for Asiedu Nketia, he should be told that it makes no difference whether he buys a coat from an expensive designer store like the rich Arabs, from “phose line” at the local market, or gets one from his wife. The fact of the matter is he does not know the difference between a man's and woman's attire. PERIOD. To respond to his concluding statement in the video, it is not a crime, and nobody is going to jail him for wearing his wife's clothes. In fact there are people who actually prefer to wear the clothing of the opposite sex. They are called transvestites or cross-dressers (viz. Kojo Basia), and if he is one of them, he should just come out of the closet and say so.

As if all that was not enough, Asiedu Nketia had the effrontery to grossly insult all of us in the diaspora in general, and our hardworking brothers and sisters employed in the care giving industry in particular, in a 2-minute radio audio clip that has also come to our notice. In that interview, the wannabe transvestite politician shamelessly, and without mincing words, states that it is diasporans who need to buy good winter coats in order to go to their jobs of washing dishes and cleaning human excreta.

First of all, the NDC General Secretary does not make any distinctions, so his statement applies to all diasporans – NPP, CPP, PPP, PNC, etc. and his own NDC. Therefore, all of us in the diaspora should take issue with his blanket appraisal. Secondly, Asiedu Nketia should know that diasporans are engaged in many different occupations – doctors, engineers, professors, nurses, entrepreneurs, teachers, lawyers, etc. Thirdly, if he was aiming directly at care givers, he should know that those hardworking men and women are engaged in one of the most honorable occupations ever.

The system makes it possible for these compassionate individuals to take good care of old, disabled, or mentally challenged people who would otherwise have a hard time taking care of themselves. Ghana would be heaven if we had a whole industry dedicated to helping and taking care of such people. Instead, this same NDC government has destroyed even our National Health Insurance Scheme that took care of the sick and pregnant mothers.

Asiedu Nketia seems to forget the immense sacrifices and contributions being made by us diasporans to help our relatives back home, and the entire national economy through our remittances. How inconsiderate, insensitive, disrespectful, arrogant, and downright stupid can anyone be, especially someone who counts himself among the top echelons of the ruling government? No wonder that a cross-section of hardworking men and women in the diaspora have been expressing their righteous indignation at this blatant show of ignorance and uncouth behavior. The loud silence of the NDC government on this issue implies their connivance and agreement with their General Secretary.

The least that Asiedu Nketia and his NDC can do is to apologize unconditionally and unreservedly to diasporans in general and care givers in particular. Ghanaians should take note of these egregious behaviors, and rightly vote these nincompoops who are steering the affairs of the state out of office, come 2016.

NPP-USA Women's Wing