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31.01.2013 Feature Article

Now Is The Hour, Supreme Court—Part 2

Now Is The Hour, Supreme Court—Part 2
31.01.2013 LISTEN

It is hoped that readers will spare some time off their busy schedule to read this long essay to quench their thirst and refresh their memories. Please read along and have an informed opinion as to how our judges should tackle the case.

BRINK OF COLLAPSE
Ghana could more or less be at the brink of collapse should your judgment have an atom of bias. The break or make of Ghana now hinges on your collective integrity. As men and women of the Supreme Court are naturally endowed with wisdom, conscience and more so, intellect, it would generally be naïve and abnormally absurd to give judgment that would forever remain as an indelible imprint and/or incredible landmark to haunt this Nation Ghana for many years to come.

Never ever does the author think that with your status in society, you'd be cajoled to condone and connive to support wrongdoing to close your eyes to disappoint majority of Ghanaians to give an impartial judgment yet, forewarned is forearmed.

You should be advised somehow and handled like the plantain in fire; any slight oversight, you might turn into charcoal. But mind you, my very respected jury; there should not be any under-estimation here to exaggerate that our brothers and sisters from Rwanda and Cote d'Ivoire are not the children of God. They are all just like Ghanaians.

And there shouldn't be any gainsaying here that they are war-mongers. Far from it! Natural justice must always prevail to allow for peace for without justice, there would obviously be no peace. The moment justice, repeat, natural justice, is denied and perverted, believe you me, that there would be an eruption of telepathic evolution of all and sundry and that is a fact for we are all living witnesses to the Egyptian, Libyan, Tunisian, and Syrian civilian unrests.

GENOCIDE
Do readers still remember the 1994 Rwanda Genocide that probably has become a taboo in that country? For those who do not know but care to know now, it is quite simple. The murder of the Rwandese president who was then a Hutu allegedly by the Tutsis of the minority group inflamed passions and that triggered and conflagrated into a civil war that consumed some 1.5 million souls from both groups – the Tutsis and the Hutus within a spate of time.

History records that the minority Tutsis occupy almost all the major civil and public positions in that country (the head of this, the head of that, the chief director of this, the chief director of that, the CEO of this, the CEO of that) and not until today as you read this piece, things have changed and normalized by way of the official portfolios, then God save the Queen. The situation would not be farfetched from that of Ghana and nobody should raise a finger here.

Then continuing, the electoral fraud and malfeasance in neighbouring La Cote d'Ivoire also culminated in the civil war that has landed the power-drunk, power-hungry and blood-thirsty Laurent Gbagbo in the hands of the International Criminal Court in The Hague.

The incorrigible Charles Taylor now faces a jail term of 50 years and one wonders whether he could ever finish this seemingly indefinite term to return to Monrovia. I could go on and on. Hope readers still remember the story about General Pinochet of Chile? After he had outlashed his compatriots and become a retiree, attention later focused on him to face the full rigours of the law.

The word of advice here is that before the honourable court takes their seats, they should always remember at the back of their minds of the Martyrs Day and its symbolic significance to their fraternity. It would only be idiotic for someone to say that Ghanaians were cowards.

And it would only be someone living on the Planet Mars who would not challenge if he were cheated like biblical Esau supposedly with the connivance of his mother when power of authority was cunningly transferred to undeserved Jacob. This undeserved transfer would perpetually create acrimony and lifelong rivalry between the two feuding factions.

RUMOUR MILL
For the information of the SC there is rumour mill doing the rounds that some suspected unknown persons have started unlimited treks to the precincts of Nana Akufo Addo's house. The rumour may or may not be true but in Ghana, every rumour has an atom of truth in it.

The logical conclusion here could be that if and when the ruling favours Nana Akufo Addo and by the time the verdict was pronounced he was dead or had been assassinated (MAY GOD FORBID 100 TIMES) by unknown assailants, presumably, by supporters or hired agents or assigns of the other faction, the rightful winner's party would have no leader but to put the country into the oblivion. In the nutshell, therefore, the writer would be pleased if special caution would be given to the government by the SC to either offer him special security or dissociate itself from this diabolic act.

COAT OF ARMS
As if it was by design or an accident; Ghana's Coat of Arms has the inscription, 'Freedom and Justice' embossed in it. That wasn't to me an accident at all by our freedom fighters i.e. the Big Six – that has Nana Akufo Addo as the only Ghanaian now with the roots from three of them – son of the late Edward Akufo Addo, the ceremonial president during the 2nd Republic when Prof. Kofi Abrefa Busia was the premier; again, Nana is the nephew of the famous Paa Willie who was better known as William Ofori Atta of the United National Convention (UNC) fame that broke away from the Popular Front Party led by Victor Owusu; and finally, he is the grandson of the inarguable Doyen of Ghana Politics, Dr. J.B. Danquah. As it has been mentioned earlier above, the decision by our fore -fathers to ensure the inscription “freedom and justice” was by no means an accident but a very well thought of one.

They had the foresight; they were forthright, they were upright in whatever they did and it is now our time and turn to continue with the good works from where they left off vis-à-vis the Dr. Ephraim Amu's song referred to in one of the above paragraphs. No labourer from the P.W.D. section ever goes to take his salary from the Education ministry at the end of the month.

Any slightest departure or intentional deviation from that would not, and never for a second, be countenanced and all should know that it would definitely be resisted fiercely or by whatever means available to the defenceless masses, so a word to the wise, is enough.

The SC should be circumspect and mindful when they compare notes as to the crucial verdict that probably would be the No.1 in a fiercely contested democratic election in Africa devoid of blood-letting.

THE TALE OF THE BUTTERFLY
A story is told of a crafty school boy who managed to catch a very beautiful, multi-coloured butterfly. He was so fascinated that what readily came to mind was to take the insect to the school and quiz his class teacher to find out whether his teacher was indeed and really someone who was well cut to be his teacher. This little boy arrived at the classroom late. Because he was late for school, he could not attend the usual morning assembly of the whole school children.

As a result of the lateness, the teacher decided to punish him by writing some lines as a way of punishment. This little unsung boy, out of the blue, mustered courage, still with his new found insect in his palm.

The next moment, all the whole class could hear was the boy's humiliating statement thus, 'Please teacher, I know that you are my teacher; I would be pleased and prepared to write the lines as my punishment but before then, to prove to me that you are my class-teacher capable of teaching me to pass my final exam without any qualms, I'd also like to quiz you before I begin with your harsh punishment.

The teacher then asked him to go ahead with his puzzle. Then the boy rose up with the butterfly in hand and said, teacher, I want you to tell me whether the butterfly that I have in my hand was dead or alive.

For a brief spell of time, the teacher, in a very pensive mood and motionless, hesitated and finally came back with a very genuine and tantalizing answer – 'Kofi, I want to tell you that if I said that the butterfly in your palm now was alive, you would crush it in your hand and open your palm to shame me whereas if I said that it was also dead, you'd open your palm and let it go to create laughter in the class. So the best answer to your puzzle was that the life of this butterfly that has become the centre of controversy between us is entirely in your own hands.

Honourable Judges of the Supreme Court, today, the precious life of Ghana or more especially, the destiny of Ghana and Ghanaians is like the butterfly in that school boy's hand. It is entirely in your own majestic and delicate hands. By your collective decision, and in your own wisdom, you can make or break it but, it is expected that the SC would, undoubtedly, never fail in its duty.

To conclude, please turn with me to the Book of James 3:5-10 “So it is with the tongue: small as it is, it can boast about great things. Just think how large a forest can be set on fire by a tiny flame! 6 And the tongue is like a fire. It is a world of wrong, occupying its place in our bodies and spreading evil through our whole being. It sets on fire the entire course of our existence with the fire that comes to it from hell itself. 7 Man is able to tame and has tamed all other creatures – wild animals and birds, reptiles and fish. 8 But no one has ever been able to tame the tongue.

It is evil and uncontrollable, full of deadly poison. 9 We use it togive thanks to our Lord and Father and also to curse our fellow-man, who is created in the likeness of God. 10 Words of thanksgiving and cursing pour out from the same mouth. My brothers, this should not happen”! Whatever judgment that comes out from the mouth of Justice Atuguba as the presiding judge of the SC will be by the help of his tongue. A word to the wise here is enough. This is the time and now is certainly the hour or never. I am done.

POSTSCRIPT
If after thorough investigations, the SC finds that Dr. Afari Djan was the principal architect and partner-in-crime, he should be compelled to divulge information about his other accomplices. On the other hand, if he decides not to disclose the names of the other members of the syndicate to be severally charged, he should be singularly charged for treason if that legal terminology was the best suitable for this particular criminal case.

His action/inaction could therefore have set Ghana ablaze. However, if there were other accomplices, they should be arraigned before court and, jointly and severally, charged for treason because their inordinate ambition and subsequent action wasn't far from any criminality than to usurp the constitutional rights and mandate of Ghanaians.

Their aim was to ensure that our votes did not matter in this context – vis-à-vis the clarion call for the 'let my vote count' campaign. A military friend says if a serving soldier commits a grievous offence tantamount to a coup d'etat, he was court marshaled and then charged as a nation wrecker; if two were caught for the same or similar offence, they were charged for conspiracy whereas if three or more military persons got caught for similar wrongdoing, they were charged for mutiny and the preferred charges and punishment given to them was sentence to death by firing squad. It is obvious Dr. Afari Djan would not disclose the names of his other friends.

If he decides to hide their identity(ies), then he should muster courage like ex-president Jerry Rawlings in May 1979 when he and some 8 NCOs were charged for mutiny; he accepted responsibility for the treasonable offence at the peril of his life and sacrificed at their expense to take blame for the NCOs to be left off the hook.

Since Dr. Afari Djan is a civilian, and the rule of law was still in vogue, he would not be sentenced to death and shot by firing squad but to be properly charged for treason in your competent court during this trial. If he is found guilty, as he has already admitted (registration of minors, false figures and the discrepancy in the number of those who voted abroad etc.) and is captured or recorded on tape, if he is found guilty, for which he cannot extricate himself and absolved from blame, that alone could be provided in your court as lead prosecution evidence, that might necessitate a minimum jail term of not less than 25 years or more.

In conclusion, now is the hour, Supreme Court, for your judges especially, those nine slated for the 'Mother of all Cases' to justify the inclusion of their names to be possibly and inarguably knighted later by Queen Elizabeth II of England for the honour that would be done her (by trying to save her the ordeal of an inevitable civil war) and to be accordingly immortalized together with other distinguished Ghanaians who, already, have their names printed in gold on a clean sheet for a place in the Guinness Book of Records. This will help relegate the Ghanaian 'norm and axiom' that all judges were corrupt to the periphery.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT
As I have always concluded my articles with biblical quotations, this one would not be different from the previous ones. The scripture is taken from 1 Kings 20:1 – 9 and the whole context centres round a war between Syria and Samaria (Israel).

I hope readers will read to know what happened; and it was in the course of event that the leaders of Samaria advised King Ahab to be courageous to say enough was enough to King Benhadad of Syria and, never, never again would he continue to tolerate the incessant intimidation and arrogance from him.

In the Ghanaian context, the 2008 election was tolerated and allowed to pass under the bridge but the gargantuan falsifications in connection with the 2012 election and its attendant fraudulent practices and mischief involving the stakeholders should not and never be glossed over. NEVER, EVER, AGAIN! Whenever the fool wizens up, then that signifies the end of the game.

HUMOUR - Why would some people like to create sensation to immortalize their names with the 'villain of the peace' tag, e.g. John here, John there, John everywhere or John is involved in this, John is involved in that, and John is involved in everything. Why?

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