Giving A Dog A Bad Name!

Did members of the Majority Caucus in Parliament want the Finance Minister, Hon. ken Ofori-Atta, to be given the boot? Yes, they did. Did many of those riding on the Elephant ask President Nana Dee to oblige the request of the Majority Caucus? Yes, they did. Clearly, almost all members of the Elephant fraternity were singing the same tune because they believed a new face at the Finance Ministry would bring fresh ideas and inspire some hope in the economy.

But one thing is clear, those from the Elephant fraternity will not allow an innocent person to be accused of corruption, where there is none. Indeed, they will not allow one of their own to be given a bad name so he could be easily hanged. I doff my hat to Hon. Osei Kyei-Mensah-Bonsu and his charges for the spirited effort in protecting their kind against a censure motion motivated by propaganda.

Knowing how diabolic the Haruna-led Minority could be, I was excited when the Majority argued that the Minister of Finance be given a fair hearing as a constitutional right. The proponents of the motion rejected the move because they knew that Ken could easily debunk their frivolous claims.

Thanks to the Speaker’s sense of fairness, a committee was set up to sit on the censure motion. We saw the highs and the lows of the proceedings. We didn’t miss the ferocious attempts by the Minority members on the committee to throw mud at Ken, which couldn’t stick. We can also attest to the fact that through it all, Ken Ofori-Atta acquitted himself very well. He proved to all and sundry that the allegations levelled against him were as frivolous as the word itself.

True to the Minority’s fear, Ken excellently dealt with the allegations one after the other to the admiration of even those who had unconsciously fallen for the barrage of lies heaped on him by the Umbrella propagandists. We all saw Ken make nonsense of all the allegations against him with incontrovertible facts and clarifications to many of the issues that appeared unwholesome from afar.

Ken, by his excellent delivery at the committee, has become the toast of many party members. Not only did he impress his party folks, but also proved his ardent critics wrong. What this means is that, Ken has won the admiration of both Osono members and non-Osono members alike.

Now that he is receiving some loud applause following the wonderful display at the committee, I would resign gracefully if I were Ken. Having now gained some modicum of respect from his compatriots, he should leave to protect his name and that of his family.

With all the lingering doubts now cleared, one cannot help but wonder if the Majority Caucus has any justification to hold on to their earlier position of President Nana Dee sacking Ken. But Ken should understand that he cannot win against the propagandists from within and outside his party. The Majority’s call for him to be sacked will not abate, despite the good showing at the committee proceedings because they still believe ‘the new face with fresh ideas’ argument is still a valid one to make.

Unlike before, his appearance at the committee, the masses are now singing a different tune from the one being sung by the Majority Caucus. Would the masses resist the attempt to compel the President to sack Ken? Or would the Majority Caucus’ stance prevail? Time will definitely tell us the answer.

Whatever the outcome, one lesson from the censure motion episode is the fact that we should always give the accused a fair hearing before making any judgment. Indeed, it is unfair to send our own people to the guillotine without hearing their side of the story. But for the Majority’s vehement insistence that Ken be given a fair hearing before any decision could be made, he would have been given a bad name and hanged by those under the eagle-headed Umbrella. What a great injustice that would have been!

See you next week for another interesting konkonsa, Deo volente!