THE STOLEN CREDIT

Now the sun is shining. There is radiance and the people of Ivory Coast can finally heave a sigh of relief. The gloomy days are gone. The people of Ivory Coast coupled with the international community has given a clear signal to tyrants of Africa that their selfish and parochial thirst and hunger for power would not plunge this continent into one of chaos, anarchy and pandemonium.

But the question every individual who has been oblivious to the happenings in Ivory Coast would ask is “how was this feat achieved?”

The attainment of peace and stabilization could never have been done without a concerted effort of the international community and most importantly West African States. At the time when the Ghanaian President had an opportunity to send a clear and unambiguous message to Laurent Gbagbo to hand over power to Alassane Ouattara as the duly elected president, the President once again displayed his lack of conviction by actually chickening out and asking Ghanaians to go back for a foreign policy that had been long abandoned in the 1970's (dzi wo fie asem policy) in the face of the global village we live. At the time the point was made that we were not the ones to select a president for Ivory Coast. In fact the president rejected the use of force as a last result even though he signed and consented to the communiqué that was issued. After people who wanted to stick to the Ecowas position had been labeled “war mongrels, after under the watch of the so called asomdwehene thousands had died with folds entering Ghana as refugees, it was a military operation by the Ouattara forces and French troops that actually captured Gbagbo and ended the war.

Just like the village witch doctor, the President turns round to take credit for the peace in Ivory Coast now. Claiming the position he took has now been vindicated. I shudder to think that any lazy mind would believe such a cock and bull story. If anyone should take credit, if there is any vindication to claim then it is the Ecowas and those who stuck by its position. In the government's bid to claim credit, they have now cooked up a story that it was the President who negotiated a deal between Yao N'Dre, the Constitutional Committee Chairman to declare Ouattara as the President of Ivory Coast leading to Ouattara's investiture. And this apparently happened when N'Dre had sought asylum in Ghana. Assuming without admitting that this account is true, is the government telling us that without N'Dre, no one could have declared Ouattara president? That according to the Ivorian constitution, when the Chairman of the constitutional council for whatever reason is unable to perform his duties there is no other person constitutionally mandated to take his place? That President Ouattara couldn't have appointed anybody to solve this constitutional absurdity and dilemma? So the question now becomes what was the real bearing or effect of the supposed negotiations by the President on the Ivorian crisis?

And so the U.N Boss on his way to the investiture of Ouattara decides to make a stopover at Ghana to ostensibly shower some few praises on the President and the State of Ghana for its purported role in helping to solve the Ivorian crisis when in fact we played no role. But hat is a good thing and a great cushion for our international reputation especially when we were needed to show strong and unwavering leadership in West Africa, at a time when Ecowas needed us and we turned our back on them. Surprisingly we woke up to Daily Graphic front page caption that reads “President Mills is the best leader in Africa” says Ban-Ki-Moon. After listening to the voice tape of the UN chief it has clearly come out that he said everything with the exception of what was reported by the State owned newspaper.

As for the allegations that the NPP machinated the publication of a report in one of the Ivorian papers that President Mills is harbouring dissidents loyal to Gbagbo in Ghana for them to regroup and destabilize the political atmosphere in Cote D'ivoire, I would treat it with the contempt it deserves because the rule of the game is evidence. We wouldn't be invited to discuss mere allegations and noise by the presidency. This sudden craze of stealing credit for things they have not done by the presidency must stop now.

At the end of the day Ouattara should be guided by the words of Martin Luther King who said, “In the end we will not remember the words of our enemies but the silence of our friends”

By Owura Kuffuor
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