Raphael Derbie's Open Letter to President Nana Addo

Dear Mr. President, it is my earnest prayer and hope that this letter finds you wherever you are. Let me use this opportunity to wish you a prosperous new year. Our elders have a say that a toad does not run in the day time but if it does, it means something is after its dear life. This letter is my first letter to you in this new year 2022. I wish to assure you that I neither write this letter from selfish motives nor from those of selfish aggrandizement. I rather wish to sincerely press on the notice of your inability to get hold of the keys to run this country and the repercussions we face as responsible citizens.

Let me again assure you and my readers that I have chosen to be measured and decorum with my diction. However, you must not misconstrue that to mean being economical with the truth and reality on ground. Mr. president, I cannot also pretend to be unaware of your trade mark of being allergic to honest and responsible Ghanaians who speak the hardcore truth as they constructively criticize the real issues in your government. That should not bar me from being patriotic as I seek to chronicle nothing but the bare facts.

First and foremost, Mr. president, unfolding events have shown us beyond every reasonable doubt that you have lost grip of the handle of running the country. The country Ghana is now on auto pilot. Some faceless individuals position themselves at a place of convenient and direct the affairs of this country at the detriment of the majority of Ghanaians. It is sometime uneasy though not surprising to believe that this country is currently under your leadership. Your words at the time you were seeking the mandate of Ghanaians to lead us grossly mismatch with what we witness today having you as the president of Ghana.

Monitoring the media space, leaves me with feeling of unfeigned regret and alarm, the level of intolerance we witness in this government. The attitude of your government has left us with no option than to dispute the age-long claim that wisdom is associated with grey hair/sakora headed persons. The level of intolerance in your government reminded of Harry Truman’s statement-once a government is committed to the principle of silencing the voice of opposition, it has only one way to go, and that is down the path of increasingly repressive measures, until it becomes a source of terror to all its citizen and creates a country where everyone lives in fear.

Mr. president, this quote is a wake-up call on you and your government to avoid the persecution and selective justice meted out to some persons in this country. We are all Ghanaians and no one is more a citizen than the other. Your insatiable penchant to silence responsible Ghanaians from unearthing the ills in your government is the trade mark of a true dictator. Groups and individuals who loud mouth in Mahama’s era are no where to be found now. Occupy Ghana, Imani Ghana, Christian Council, Anas Aremeyaw (Tiger Eye), Manasseh Azure Awuni are just a few groups and individuals who have been cowed to silence because of the intolerance of your government.

The impunity with which the fourth arm of government, the Media, is attacked under your regime must be condemned in no uncertain terms. Ghanaians have the collective responsibility of unearthing the odds, lampooning the norms of impunity, expressing to no uncertain terms, the repulsive and distasteful attitude of petty politicking in the country. This must be thoroughly examined and critically hooked particularly in an environment of rising arrogance, ignorance and the unfortunate phenomenon of consistent leadership deficit under this regime.

Mr. president, your campaign message at the time was running on the wheels of corruption. You unjustifiably labelled lambasted the erstwhile John Mahama administration as corrupt and promised to fight corruption head on. Today, it is unfortunate that we have you as the president of Ghana. All that you condemned at the time are manifestly clear and worse-off today than ever. It is only under your tenure that a health minister like Kweku Agyemang Manu is still at post after his actions clearly confirmed corrupt act-the Sputnik Vaccine saga. This was made quite apparent when he appeared before the parliamentary select committee. The Australia Visa scandal, the PDS scandal are but a few doubtless corrupt acts you swept under the carpet.

Again Mr. president, you described the erstwhile Mahama’s administration as incompetent. It is very conspicuous that your leadership exhibits how substandard and grossly incompetent you and your government are. Now, reality has exposed you as you fail woefully to demonstrate your past claim of competence superiority over the John Mahama and the NDC. You again claimed in open camera that you had the men in your government unfortunately, your men have proven to be men without balls/men hood. The competence of you yourself, your health minister, former energy minister, deputy information minister and a host of others have been consistently questioned. You told Ghanaians how you were misled by your former energy minister to sign a dubious deal. Kind courtesy to the vigilant minority group, the name of Ghana would have been dragged into the mud again. Your health minister told the entire world his inability to reason well yet he is left out of the hook and is still at post. How ridiculous that can be! This is enough a justification that the country is on auto pilot.

Mr. president, your assurance to Ghanaians to protect the public purse has turned out to be a political rhetoric. Your unrepentant taste for rented jet and ‘air-bathing’ spree against the ailing Ghanaian economy completely reveals your true character of callousness against the plight of Ghanaians. Your name has gone down in the archives of Ghana’s history as the most deceitful and worst president of all. You promised to reduce fuel price. You assured us of reduction of goods and services and many other flowery rhetorics that are not feasible. The videos of these political gimmicks are flying in social media and that should have guided you to glean a bit of credibility for yourself. But you decide to turn a blind eye to them, the reason why you continue to do what you do. This is an indictment on a president of Ghana and not you as an individual. You as a person has credibility deficit. You have no guilty conscience because having one will mean submitting to the moral verdict of self-guilt.

Conclusively, Mr. president, I must concede that you have found yourself in a desperate situation. You never thought of it. It really calls for drastic remedies to get you out of the situation you created for yourself. The only antidote though difficult is that you honourably resign as the president and allow people who are ready to develop the country, to do so. This decision may earn you some little dignity because you have none now. Thank you.

Yours faithfully,

…………signed……….

Raphael Derbie

0240371356