On the Run: Obed Asamoah Cautions System Buckers Like Togbe Afedi

It is rather amusing to reckon the fact that the same National Democratic Congress’ stalwarts who vigorously campaigned for the creation of additional administrative regions, in order to speed up the development of the country, are presently fiercely fighting to regress the same, obviously because their political race-horse, namely, then-President John Dramani Mahama, miserably and massively lost the 2016 Presidential Election to then-Candidate Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo of the now-ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP). Having successfully rigged the 2012 Presidential Election, by the public testimony of Mr. Johnson Asiedu-Nketia, the General-Secretary of the National Democratic Congress (NDC), the Mahama Posse had hoped to author the creation of these proposed new regions, I believe, five in all at my last count, with a repeat of their 2012 electoral shenanigans.

Studiously following the national discourse on this subject, one would think it was only the Northern-Volta located proposed Oti Region that was at stake. There are, of course, such other proposed new regions as Ahafo, which is to be carved out of the present-day Brong-Ahafo Region, and the Western-North Region to be legally divorced from the present Western Region. There may be two or three other proposed regions that presently escape my mnemonic recall faculties. It is, however, worth noting that the last region-creation to be done was effected by the Jerry John Rawlings-led junta of the Provisional National Defense Council (PNDC). And it involved the splitting of the former Upper Region, whose capital was Bolgatanga, into the Upper-East and Upper-West regions. Today, the capital of the Upper-East Region is still Bolgatanga, while Wa, which used to be just a district capital, is the administrative headquarters of the Upper-West region.

Those of us who have studiously followed the trend of region-creation in Ghana can attest to the fact that it brings development closer to citizens resident in relatively remote parts of the country. For instance, not very long ago, Nana Obiri Boahen, one of the Deputy Chairpersons of the ruling New Patriotic Party, wistfully recalled the fact that until the creation of the Brong-Ahafo Region and the latter’s autonomous carving out of the Asante Region, the center of all political and commercial activities in both the former Western Asante Region and the Asante Region Proper was Kumasi, which was also the traditional capital of the Asante Empire. The rest of that vast region was decidedly cut off from the great comforts of modern culture and civilization, otherwise known as the “bright lights.” Today, the Brong-Ahafo Region is far better developed than it used to be as the backwoods or hinterland of the old Asante Region.

What is interesting to note here is that, as significantly pointed out by Dr. Obed Asamoah, Ghana’s longest-serving Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, as well as Foreign Minister, both then-President Mahama and then-Candidate Akufo-Addo vigorously campaigned on the necessity for the creation of additional regions as a salutary means of speeding up the development of the country in the runup to the 2016 general election. At the time, overnight system buckers like Togbe Afedi, XIV, and Togbe Howusu, the latter’s traditional military commander or tribal warlord, of the so-called Asogli State, which encompasses the Volta regional capital of Ho, were staunchly and perfectly in agreement with the proposed creation of the Oti Region.

Predictably, once the practical process of such creation began to be executed by the newly elected President Akufo-Addo, Togbe Afedi and his associates, largely partisans of the main opposition National Democratic Congress, began to recognize everything that could possibly be wrong with the process, although the stentorian and imperious Asogli chieftain has yet to pin-point a single step in the process of the creation of the Oti Region that either Mr. Daniel Botwe, the Minister in charge of Regional Reorganization, or President Akufo-Addo has flouted. It is also significant to highlight the fact that contrary to what the Asogli overlord would have the rest of the nation believe, and even as Dr. Asamoah expertly points out, Ghana’s Fourth-Republican Constitution permits only the petitioners of the areas demanding the creation of new and autonomous regions to vote in such a referendum, as clearly stipulated by the Constitution.

But what is even more significant to point out here is that aside from his legal expertise on this matter, the 82-year-old Dr. Asamoah speaks with the uncontestable voice and conviction of authority because the former University of Ghana law faculty lecturer is also a bona fide native of Likpe-Kukurantumi, a township in the heart of the area earmarked for the creation of the Oti Region by the close of this year. For passionate political partisans like Togbe Afedi and his tribal warlord, to wit, Togbe Howusu, for ready examples, on the other hand, the creation of the Oti Region comes as just another patently unsavory and epically unacceptable electioneering feather on the political hat of President Akufo-Addo. Rather too bad for these sore losers and their ilk.

*Visit my blog at: kwameokoampaahoofe.wordpress.com Ghanaffairs

By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., PhD

English Department, SUNY-Nassau

Garden City, New York
November 4, 2018
E-mail: [email protected]