Who says it’s frivolous for Mahama and Bawumia to debate over the shameful Airbus bribery?

I do not want to accept the seemingly isolated thinker’s view that the pre-election debates are of less importance and serve no purpose.

In my humble opinion, pre-election debates give the candidates the opportunity to clear the air over the vineyard news such as the embarrassing Airbus bribery and corruption scandal being linked to former President John Dramani Mahama.

Do the brassbound NDC supporters want to tell us that the Government Official 1 has no question to answer over the Europe’s aerospace multinational Airbus bribes to officials of Ghana during Mills/Mahama administration between 2009 and 2015?

Sometime in 2020, following on from the United Kingdom Serious Fraud Office’s Airbus thematic probe, President Akufo-Addo instructed the then Special Prosecutor, Martin Amidu to investigate the identity of the said Government Official One implicated in the Airbus shameful bribery and corruption scandal.

Needless to say, following an investigation into the apparent damning scandal, the Office of the Special Prosecutor finally concluded that the said Government Official 1 in the Airbus bribery scandal was the former president and the 2020 flagbearer of NDC, John Dramani Mahama.

The report, however, concluded that since we were in the election period and the said protagonist was a presidential candidate, the Office of the Special Prosecutor was not in a position to take any immediate action.

While it is true that the Brazilian president, Luiz Inacio Lula Da Silva, returned to the presidency after being investigated, prosecuted, convicted, and sentenced to nine years and six months in prison on corruption and money-laundering charges, it is absolutely wrong for the NDC loyalists to pontificate somewhat impetuously that Mahama is going to emulate the Brazilian leader in 2024.

It is worth noting that unlike Ghana where the incumbent and former presidents are ridiculously insulated by the irrational and somewhat dowdy indemnity clauses, the Brazilian constitution is not respecter of persons. The past and incumbent heads of state may face the full rigour of the law without any recourse to their status.

In Ghana, the traditional exemption of heads of state from prosecution despite the evidence of a case to answer is wrong, so to speak. For if the bribery and corruption, dubious judgment debt payments, stashing of national funds by some greedy opportunists and misappropriation of resources and crude embezzlement by some politicians do not warrant criminal charges, then where are we heading as a nation?

To me, it is about time we expunged and tossed the ludicrous indemnity clauses from the constitution into the bin to pave way for the prosecution of the suspected incumbent and former presidents.

If, indeed, there are bribery and corruption scandals hanging on the neck of a former president who has the opportunity to return to the presidency, why can’t he be investigated?

More so, the preposterous and somewhat tentative argument by the teeming supporters that after all Akufo-Addo is allegedly much more corrupt than Mahama and therefore must be left alone is neither here nor there.

For argument sake, if Ghana’s constitution allows Akufo-Addo to return to the presidency at some point, who says that it won’t be fair and proper for him to be investigated over any alleged bribery and corruption scandal hanging around his neck?

Likewise, if Mahama wants to return to the presidency, it is incumbent on him to clear the doubts on the minds of Ghanaians over the alleged bribery and corruption scandals hanging around his neck.

Some of us were expecting Mahama to lock horns with the Attorney-General under Mills/Mahama administration, Martin Amidu, when he unhesitatingly told Ghanaians a few years ago that the late President Mills set up a committee to investigate a suspicious Brazilian Aircrafts deal negotiated by the then Vice President Mahama, but he has since refused to square up with Amidu.

It was, therefore, quite ironic when Ex-President John Dramani Mahama dared President Akufo-Addo to arrest, investigate and prosecute him or any member of his administration if there is incontrovertible evidence to suggest that they amassed wealth illegally during their time in office (See: Catch the ‘supposed’ thieves to prove your charges – Mahama dares Akufo-Addo; ghanaweb.com, 30/04/2018).

But contrary to former President Mahama’s endless denials of rampant corruption in his administration, a competent court of jurisdiction has since convicted four of the numerous corruption suspects in the erstwhile NDC administration and sentenced them to prison.

In spite of the fact that corruption is a serious economic, social, political and moral impediment to the nation building, our corrupt officials are bent on siphoning our scarce resources to the detriment of the poor and disadvantaged Ghanaians.

The president of a nation is a serious job and as such it requires serious and committed person, therefore, if corruption cases are hanging on the neck of an individual who is going to look after the national coffers and has so far unwilling to seriously disprove such allegations, then Ghanaians have to be really careful about handing him another term in office.

K. Badu, UK.
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