Vigilantism Disbandment Dialogue: A Waste Of Public Resources

Whatever the snake hatches, our elders say, must be long.

I had a painful instant "erection" when I listened to Hon. Yaw Buaben Asamoah, Member of Parliament for Adenta who doubles as Director of NPP Communications, as well as the General Secretary of the opposition NDC, Mr. Johnson Aseidu Nketia, about the dialogue to disband party militias during their separate interviews on Citi Fm.

As a student and a youngster in Africa where I am expected to be seen and not be heard, I should not say I got angry listening to both communication giants of the two political parties, instead, I had an erection.

It was shocking to note that even on matters of security of citizens, the two rival political party "merchants" couldn't come to consensus!

Like the ideological bifurcation and disintegration of our nationalists moments in the 1950s during the decolonization struggle, when slogans such as "self-government now" and its twin phrase of "self-government within the shortest possible time" emerged, two similar phraseologies popped up after the meeting to disband political militia groups: The NDC wanted "political vigilantism" in all its ramifications crashed whilst the NPP stood for eradicating "political party vigilantism" in all its ramifications.

Can you see the difference?
If I may be allowed to be frank, I must say that this so-called bipartisan approach to resolve the devastating political party militias alias "vigilantism" is nothing more than an avenue to waste our national kitty with a swag of impunity!

How many commissions of inquiry have we set up over the years in different governments, yet we never see any manifestations of the relevance of these commissions of inquiries.

Recent ones in both regimes of the NDC and the NPP are for example, the Justice Dzemefeh Commission of inquiry into the Brazil 2014 world cup fiasco, and the just ended Justice Emily Short Commission of inquiry into the Ayawuso West Wuogon constituency by-election violence January this year (2019).

Why do our leaders cherish a special and a "legitimate" creation of create-loot-and-share of our very limited resources?

For how long should our leaders continue to organize dinners with taxpayers' money for so-called experts to come together and banquet upon our meagre resources under the guise of resolving problems that are explicitly and naturally dealt with in the constitution?

But say what you like, obviously, President Akufo- Addo is still in a comfortable lead mood and in a hurry to nowhere with outright misplacement of priorities and a miscalculated approach to governance as if he was resurrected from coma to govern.

Governance is still a serious business, not so?
Believe it or not, one thing is obvious: if as a presidential candidate, your blueprint is more littered with food-for-vote campaign rhetorics than food-for-thought campaign messages, you can't control the "boys" after winning political power.

Indeed, according to David Easton, a political system exists for those at the helm of affairs to process the demands of their people into decisions and actions for the benefit of all citizens.

President Akufo-Addo's so-called commitment to fight "vigilantism" (party militia) is the most nauseating commitment he can ever make.

Leo Tolstoy once said that "I sit on a man's back, choking him, and making him carry me, and yet assure myself and others that I am very sorry for him and wish to ease his lot by any means possible, except getting off his back"!

The President is ready to fight party militia who are destabilizing the peace of Ghanaians, jeopardizing our democratic ethos, maiming and wasting lives of citizens, except allowing loose on perpetrators, the full weight of the law.

Isn't it a betrayal of competence, embezzlement of trust and justice, for President Akufo- Addo to continue this hubbub verbal ventilation on fighting vigilantism?

Perhaps, the most unscientific aspect of the whole issue of tackling this canker is the fact that none of the two major political parties accepts to have in their midst an illegal association of these groups spoken about thereof let alone disbanding them.

If a disease is not diagnosed, how do you cure it?
Yet the state would be required to fund such a useless venture with time and money without results in the end!

How can we continue to wastefully spend the paltry resources in such a mindblowing manner?

Of course, deception is part of politics and according to Andrews Heywood, politics in one breadth is the practice of deception and manipulation!

Fellow Ghanaians, unless the President is looking for opportunity to make good use of this aspect of politics (deception), it would be an unjustifiable attack on the collective common sense of Ghanaians to be calling for dialogue to end activities of party militias when the membership of this same group is roaming on the streets having completed executing atrocities against citizens?

Didn't cameras capture the political hoodlums who went berserk gunning down citizens at La Bawlashi during the early hours of the elections.

What at all did Mr. President want to hear for establishing a commission of inquiry?

Who has been arrested or taken responsibility for that electoral violence despite the contradiction galore in the statements of both ministers and commanders who appeared before the Emily Short Commission of inquiry?

What was the essence of wantonly using public fund to set up this Commission of inquiry?

Has the money spent on this findings team or commission yielded any profit to Ghana or it consumed our time and resources?

Why would Mr. President waste everybody's time and resources of Ghanaians again, calling for a predictably fruitless dialogue to end the same problem, which solutions already spelt out in the 1992 constitution were brushed aside?

When the long mouth of the dog is insulted, the crocodile in the pond is affected. President Akufo- Addo should be blamed as a credible alternative Ghanaians elected after losing trust in the previous government.

His Excellency has conveniently refused to make functional, Article 58, Clause 1&2 of the 1992 constitution that offers him Executive Authority as the first gentleman of the land in getting this political bad boys punished.

Truth be told, nobody bites the finger that feeds him. These thuggery activities had been carried out over the eight years to bring the President from opposition into power, and if he can't offer them jobs, at least, he should not incarcerate them.

However, until the right methods are used in dealing with this cancerous canker, no amount of bipartisan dialogue can disband any of this party militias if we continue to have dormant laws that are relaxed on politically protected criminals.

No amount of bipartisan approach to disband political party militias can be effective if the "employers" of members continue to employ their services.

No amount of legislation can coup de grâce political party vigilantism, if with unstable "political hedonism" we continuously choose to mortgage our lives and the future of this country in exchange for political power!

President Akufo-Addo has something to lose if he doesn't change his methods of fighting this menace so quickly: His throne would fast become more unstable if the polity continues to be unstable as a result of activities of "home bred" political party militias come 2020.

Long Live Ghana,
God Bless us all.
The writer is a student at KNUST, Department of Religious Studies.

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