The NPP Is Trying To Get Us To Accept Violence, But We Must Reject It

For the past several days, I haven’t heard of NPP vigilante members attacking or locking out public officers. I haven’t heard of them seizing public offices or government installations. I haven’t heard of them going on the rampage or causing mayhem in any part of the country. Ordinarily, this should be good news! But it irks me, it rips my heart asunder, it gnaws at my liver that I even have to think that NPP hooligans might commit one atrocity or another.

And my sad reality is that they are likely to continue to wreak havoc. Yes havoc! Havoc on a massive scale. The havoc is not much of the act per se but the catastrophic effect is it seeking to implant on our collective psyche as Ghanaians: the gradual numbing of our sense of repulsion toward violence, the insidious pollution of our pristine perception of decent conduct; the justification of an entitlement mentality, a mangled mentality that says, “slash and burn; your party is in power!” It is an agenda to get us so inured to violence through the power of regularity and consistence. The perpetrators and their brazen backers, including those who try to make light of it- are implementing a policy of “we will do it until they get tired of talking about”, I surmise.

The constant resort to violence over the past ten months is an indication that the use of violence has become an alternative in resolving matters. It is grim proof that lawlessness is an acceptable option in our scheme of things. And the prerequisite to its use is membership of the NPP, the ruling party, the party given coercive powers by Ghana’s citizens to ensure law and order.

The frequency of NPP ‘thuggery’ may have dulled our sense of aversion to violent conduct of that nature but we must not allow ourselves to get used to it, we must not adjust our mental spaces in order to accommodate it. We must consciously refuse to adapt to it. We must continue to reject it with all the contempt we can muster. Corruption from politicians is no longer as shocking( which is a sad development), but we must continue to be shocked by this new addition. It’s a horrible addition. We must continue to speak up against it.

Now some person may prefer that I say some NPP members or some groups within the NPP are trying to get us used to the unpleasantness of violence( that is if they even agree with my assertion), but I maintain that it is the NPP that is trying to get us used to it. The fantastic SHS policy is eagerly claimed by NPP members yet not all of them are involved in its implementation. They must accept the violence of their vigilante groups wholeheartedly and deal with it. The vigilante violence is rapidly eroding the goodwill of decent Ghanaians for the NPP. And may just be that which will kick the NPP out of power. We can’t afford to, and we shouldn’t get used to the NPP violence.