NDC Attacks Gyimah Boadi & Adjepong

…“It Is An Attempt To Put Up A Bogus And Fraudulent Defence Of Prez. Kufuor And NPP Govt”.

CRUSADING GUIDE -- The National Democratic Congress (NDC) has attacked Professors Samuel Adjepong and Gyimah Boadi for their effort at throwing more light and clarifying the African Peer Review Mechanism Report launched at Abuja in Nigeria on the 19th June, 2005.

At a press confab held in Accra last Tuesday, the NDC led by Mr. Samuel Ofosu Ampofo, its National Organiser described as “bogus and fraudulent” the attempt by the Chairman of the National APRM Governing Council, Prof. Adjepong and Prof. Gyimah Boadi, to explain to the Ghanaian public what the APRM Report stood for, as captured in the publications of the “Ghanaian Times” of Friday, June 24, 2005 and the Daily Graphic of Saturday, June 25, 2005.

Having taking note of the Ghana APRM Report as being of a fairy balanced and objective nature, the NDC said it was “baffled at what appears to be an orchestrated attempt by otherwise respectable individuals and organizations to distance either President Kufuor or the NPP Government or both from especially the negative aspects of the Report, and to create the impression that it was Ghana as a country that was the subject of the Report without reference to the leadership of the country under whose auspices the Report was prepared”.

According to Mr. Ampofo, the NDC was amazed at how the NPP Government and its spokespersons sought to take credit for the positive comments in the Report “but through the instrumentality of the same individuals and organizations seek to share the shortcomings and blame in the Report with the NDC Government and the country as a whole”.

The NDC said a careful analysis of the various reactions to the APRM Report indicated that the President was let down by his peers through the review process when he thought he was rather going to be redeemed “from his dismal failures as President and provide him some respite from his personal woes”.

It accused the Kufuor administration of using Professors and eminent persons as rescuers whenever the Government found “its back against the wall”.

To justify the above assertion, Ampofo cited the appointment of Prof. Ivan Addae-Mensah as the Chairman of the National Petroleum Tender Board and his defence of what the NDC termed “outrageous fuel price increases”.

Ampofo said the “the present attempt to use Professors Adjepong and Gyimah Boadi to rationalise the adverse APRM Report appears to fit into the pattern”.

He, however added that the Professors were entitled to t heir views except that their attempted defence is 'bogus and fraudulent' and had no basis in fact and logic.

The NDC debunking the explanations offered by the Professors, said the APRM exercise was a Peer Review exercise of African Presidents and that whereas individuals had peers, countries had no peers, “and to say that 'Peer Review Mechanism' refers to a country is to abuse the English language”.

The NDC contended that the APRM exercise could not have involved a period covering the regimes of the NPP and the NDC, making the point that President Paul Kagame's review of his leadership of Rwanda would not have covered the period of the Rwandan genocide because Kagame was then not ruling Rwanda.

It expressed worry about what it said was the inability of the Professors to check the Pro-NPP media's adulation of President Kufuor regarding the positive aspects of the APRM Report on him, but rather they (Professors) finding everything wrong with those sections of the media that gave Kufuor credit for the negatives in the Report.

According the NDC, Prez. Kufuor could not have done anything about the APRM Report and the procedures and the process once he submitted himself to the Peer Review Mechanism.

It said just as President Kufuor had submitted himself to the Peer Review Mechanism so also did ex-President Rawlings submit himself and Government to the Governance and Anti-Corruption Survey in his time.

The NDC noted that just as it ensured that the Governance and Anti-Corruption Report was not published for its implications for the 2000 elections, it was consistent in maintaining that the APRM Report was not published in 2004 for the same reason.

The party slighted the mode of appointment of the members of the Peer Review Council (PRC), saying it was susceptible to the membership being loyal to the President for the honour done them by the appointment.

It said despite claims by the Professors that the APRM exercise was not a point-scoring exercise, the Ghanaian Minister for Regional Integration and NEPAD, Dr. Kofi Konadu Apraku made a point in the media to the effect that Ghana had already passed “even before the results of the review were released”.

The NDC said it was in agreement with the Report's recommendation that there must be an upper ceiling for appointments of Judges to the Supreme Court and that President Kufuor did abuse the open-ended nature of appointments to the Supreme Court in the case of Tsatsu Tsikata vrs. Attorney General case.