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15.11.2004 General News

President's Secret 7-Hour Meeting With JJ

15.11.2004 LISTEN
By Chronicle

The Chronicle on Saturday reported in its last edition that a cabinet minister in the former National Democratic Congress (NDC) government, Mr. Kwamena Ahwoi has alleged that President Kufuor and the ex president Rawlings held in his own words "two secret meetings" where they interacted and discussed a number of issues after the former had been sworn in as president of Ghana.

He said one of the meetings which he was privilege to attend lasted seven good hours. It started at 9pm and ended at 4am the following day. In the said meeting he said the two leaders eat and drank together in a friendly manner.

Speaking in an interview with Takoradi's number one radio station, Goodnews Fm yesterday Ahwoi said the relationship between the current president and his predecessor was very cordial until those who fled the country as a result of the PNDC rule returned to join the current government and started feeding Kufuor with what he described as bogus information.

He noted that the present security coordinator was in exile for nearly 20years so naturally he would not allow peace to exist between Kufuor and the ex president.

According to Ahwoi it appeared president Kufuor was being fed with wrong information by his security apparatus hence the strain relationship between him and Rawlings including blunders being caused by his government.

He said when NDC was in government they had what he called counter intelligence in addition to the normal intelligence network of the government. He aid any information they received was counter checked to make sure that they had the right information and act appropriately.

"In fact you will always be deceived by your intelligence if you do not have the counter intelligence and this is what President Kufuor is suffering from. He is being fed with certain information that are not usually correct and he needs to be careful about that", he said.

Ahwoi mentioned the recent alleged coup plot, which the government is trying to push the blame to the media. Ahwoi contended that the summary of the statement issued by the police indicated that there was a coup plot and wondered how a person found with an outmoded pistol could be described as a coup plotter.

He said the coup scare sent wrong signal to the international community some of who kept on calling Ghana to find out what was happening. He said there were others who also called to find out whether ex president Rawlings had been hurt or not.

According to him Rawlings has been describing current government as murders because of the way they have criminalized his government.

He also defended the letter written to world leaders by the ex president about the pending elections adding that the said letter was not different from the press conference addressed by the flagbearer of the NDC, Prof. Atta Mills in Accra recently.

When his host, Kwesi Essel asked him whether he would be prepared to serve in any revolutionary government again, Ahwoi replied that if the objectives that necessitated the Rawlings revolution, which he served, should come up again, he would not hesitate to avail himself. He however said he would not be available to serve in Prof. Mills' government.

He further told his audience that there was nothing wrong with the citizen vetting committee, which he chaired in the heat of the Rawlings revolution. He said despite the public outcry against some of the decisions taken by the committee nobody went to the NRC to raise the issue. This, to him, meant that the people themselves knew they committed the offences for which they were punished. He alleged that most of the offenders were evading taxes.

On the allegation that a vote for Mills is a vote for Rawlings, Kwamena said it was a propaganda work that the government is doing. "If a vote for Mills is a vote for Rawlings, then a vote for Kufuor is a vote for president Eyadema of Togo, that brutal dictator who Kufuor has been consulting on 24hr basis", he added.

When his host again asked him about the corruption charges being leveled against some of the NDC ministers, he replied that no NDC minister had been charged with corruption. He said what NPP is using against them is the law on causing financial loss to the state which they themselves promulgated. He said Kwame Pepra and others are in jail not because of corruption and cited the statement made by the late Justice Afreh when he read his judgment on the Prepah's case.

If they are using this law against us today then they should know that most of the NPP ministers will be in jail because every decision they take has its own risk, Ahwoi said.

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