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30.03.2011 Feature Article

A Rejoinder to Nduom: Is Nduom destroying or building the CPP?

A Rejoinder to Nduom: Is Nduom destroying or building the CPP?
30.03.2011 LISTEN

It is interesting that the office of Dr. Papa Kwesi Nduom chooses to respond to me, “the so-called Akwesi Prempeh.” Let me first state categorically that I am a breathing, living human being. Secondly, I am not competing for any elective position in the CPP. And for what I know Dr. Papa Kwesi Nduom has not declared his intentions for any elective position for a constituency or region in the party for which elections will be conducted during the forthcoming National Congress of the CPP. So who are his faceless competitors, or who are the “leading” members of the CPP who would sponsor “a so-called Akwesi Prempeh to float some incredible stories about the party, the leadership and Dr. Nduom?”

In the first place Dr. Nduom in a bid to appear clean vis-a-vis allegations in the article he responded to rather chose to side-step the real and credible stories and issues raised against him and the current party leadership. He instead portrayed himself as the Mr. “Nice Guy,” laying out how he would want us to see him. Why didn't he specifically answer for instance the issue about parallel structures he is creating within CPP? Is it not true that Papa Kwesi Nduom or his operatives went to Hohoe, Cape Coast, Jomoro and other constituencies and used unfair election tactics to try to create his own new constituency executives instead of having the existing constituency and regional party executives conduct fresh elections?

Let me get down to the issues that I raised in my previous article. One, I raised the issue of lack of accountability and transparency at party's head office. Specifically I wrote: “The treasurer was unable to properly present the accounts of the party at the NEC meeting. When questions of clarity were asked, he stood there, at times blank, at times sifting through the documents until the Chairman intervened to unsatisfactorily answer the questions. This happened several times before it was decided that the accounts needed to be reviewed again.” Nduom failed miserably to address this issue. He rather claimed: “He was the first to support the National Organisational Committee of the party with financial support for the center and additional support for each of the ten regions.”

If there is no laid out system of accountability and transparency at the national level, one wonders what might be going on in the regions. Will Nduom support a call on the national leadership to submit the party's financial records for proper audit? Hopefully copies of such audited records will be submitted to the Electoral Commission (EC) to meet the party's obligation to the EC.

The second issue I raised in my previous article dealt with the leadership of the party not being in touch with the grassroots. There are no party offices in the constituencies. Interestingly, a recent GNA report indicated the CPP did not have any functioning constituency offices in the Greater Accra Region. Yet Dr. Papa Kwesi Nduom met with the Hreater Regional Executives. One wonders where Dr. Papa Kwesi Nduom met the Greater Accra Regional Executives of the party. Was the meeting at the national party office or his hotel?

The party needs to be seen as existing on the ground, as well as appearing virtually in cyberspace on the Facebook, Twitter, Google or Yahoo. After all the constituency and regional elections for the party's executives are being conducted on the ground not in cyberspace. How many of Nduom's 10,000 Facebook fans live in rural Ghana where the mobile phone is more used to receive calls than to make calls? Where people have not seen the computer let alone have access to the Internet? Where are the party cells that he has and the leadership formed in the constituencies where the party functionaries meet for party education and political consciousness?

In talking about political consciousness, Dr Papa Kwesi Nduom exposes his lack of political consciousness by asserting that “very few can boast of the kind of transformational initiatives he is credited with. These include the Single Spine Salary Structure, the Millennium Challenge Account grant, the New Pension Law, the National Identification System and others.”

If Dr. Nduom takes credit for Single Spine Salary Structure (SSSS) he must realize the problems with any public policy lie not only in the implementation of the policy. Much of the problems in public policy also stem from the fuzziness built into the policy in the formulation stage of the policy process. If he helped formulate the SSSS, he must, therefore, accept some of the blame for what is wrong with the SSSS.

The Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) that he takes credit for is a neo-colonial trap he helped push Ghana into. It is common knowledge now as to how the US used the MCA to threaten Ghana not to buy the Kosmos shares in the Jubilee Field that the US oil company was offering for sale. We cannot take control of our oil because, in the neo-colonial relations Ghana finds herself in vis-à-vis the powers that be, we cannot bite the US and the other donors' hand that feeds us. How do we then fight for our economic independence, Dr. Nduom?

Since the overthrow of the CPP government in 1966 Ghana has been pushed more and more into being a neo-colony. And the MCA is a good example of initiatives formulated and implemented from outside with local supporters to transform Ghana into a neo-colony. According to Kwame Nkrumah, the founder of the CPP, “Under neocolonialism, the economic systems and political policies of independent territories are managed and manipulated from outside, by international monopoly finance in league with the indigenous bourgeoisie.”

How then does Nduom take credit for MCA and expect his Movement or CPP will be a viable alternative to NDC or NPP that have implemented MCA, ERP, SAP, and HIPC since 1983? If Nduom is refusing to acknowledge that MCA is a neo-colonialist ploy then his political astuteness is suspect. The earlier he disassociated himself from neo-colonial tactics the better it would be for him. Because the CPP would not allow Dr. Papa Kwesi Nduom to be in bed with neo-colonialists and at the same time purport to be representing the party's interests. He would not be allowed to be a wolf in sheep's skin confusing the young minds. He should get rid of not only the neo-colonial garb but also the the “skirt and blouse” or he is advised to exit the door like Freddie Blay just did.

Apparently Dr Nduom does not realize how through initiatives like the MCA he has helped intensify the external cooptation of the Ghana government's policy decision-making. Yet Dr. Papa Kwesi Nduom speaks of New Economic Independence Movement for Ghana. How does that sit with CPP's core principle of Self Determination? Does Dr. Papa Kwesi Nduom, the “accomplished management consultant, entrepreneur and public servant,” understand this core principle of the CPP? Does he espouse this core principle out of conviction or he is just engaging in sloganeering? Or is that an admission of his poverty of ideas and his lack of ideological clarity?

If MCA is an example of what CPP under Dr. Papa Kwesi Nduom leadership will offer as the alternative to NDC/NPP, then he must realize that is not real change. The people are not buying the damaged goods of neo-colonial initiatives like MCA that Dr. Papa Kwesi Nduom is peddling.

Dr Nduom must realize not everyone who criticizes him is his competitor for a position in the CPP or someone sponsored by his competitors. I see myself as offering constructive criticism hoping that the “one-man Kwesi Nduom show” in the CPP will end. Dr. Papa Kwesi Nduom should try not to engage in unfair election tactics to stack the deck against his competitors and expect that “leading members [of the party will] also commit themselves now to support anyone elected to national executive positions and flagbearer without conditions.” If anyone uses unfair election tactics to gain advantage, then the losers in the election are not going to give their support before or after the election.

For Nduom to sound credible in demanding such commitment from leading members of the party, he should first admit the “skirt and blouse” strategy he used against Aggudey in 2004 was wrong. Nduom must render a sincere apology for that.

Nduom claims “The CPP has gone through several challenges, most especially in the Fourth Republic.” One of these challenges has been opportunism where individuals put their personal interests over and above the party's interests and principles. As Nkrumah put it: “One can compromise over programme, but not over principles. Any compromise over principle is the same as an abandonment of it ... never compromise over principle” (Kwame Nkrumah).

Dr. Papa Kwesi Nduom may fool some people some of the time, but he cannot fool all the people all the time. Dr. Papa Kwesi Nduom's neo-colonial initiatives like MCA do not jive with the principles of the CPP. Dr. Papa Kwesi Nduom should seriously consider taking such neo-colonial initiatives to some other political party not the CPP so that CPP will be seen as real alternative to NDC/NPP.

There is victory for us. Forward Ever.

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