Come Again Ashanti Minister!

Giving democracy a bad name and hanging this ideal form of governance is no doubt the desire of the elderly Ashanti Regional Minister. Kofi Poku Manu has lost his honour as a minister of a wonderful region like the Ashanti Region. When such a character is bestowed with such a respectable high office, the people of the region and indeed the country as a whole, cannot expect good governance. We would be hard pushed not to use harsh words for a man the age of the regional minister who directs his party supporters to beat up their New Patriotic Party (NPP) counterparts when, according to him, they use uncomplimentary words on the government. Blimey! Does the minister know what he is about? In fact, the kind of uncivil behaviour the brutish minister is asking his party supporters to mete out to their compatriots in the NPP is anything but decorous. For anybody seeking proof of the appointment of irresponsible and unqualified persons to high office, the Ashanti Regional minister is a perfect example. He is not only unfit to pass for a Team B minister, but equally unfit to be part of a civilized group of men in governance. That in this day and age, a minister would ask members of a ruling party to assault their brothers and sisters in the largest opposition party under a democratic dispensation, is to say the least crazy and imbecilic. We might have gotten it all wrong because the man could after all be suffering from a rare form of schizophrenia and requiring some psychiatric attention. The Appointments Committee of Parliament could have easily noted the unsuitability of this character when he appeared before it. Maybe, the ruling party�s membership in the committee pressed all buttons to ensure that the glaring shortcomings of the clown were subdued. Well, whatever happened when he was dissected to determine his suitability or otherwise, he is now in full flight displaying his worth as a failed minister. We would not be wrong if we predict that as the head of the Regional Security Council, otherwise known as REGSEC, this man, if not restrained by professionals like the Regional Police Commander and the Commanding Officer of 4 Bn in the Ashanti Regional capital, could set the Garden City ablaze one day through his unbridled rhetoric. If the minister does not know it, Ghana is practising multi-party democracy where the NDC alone cannot exist. We are unable to determine the man�s level of education but can state without skepticism that he appears to need, besides a psychiatric attention, some schooling about what democracy is all about. We are equally surprised that he was not restrained from inciting the NDC supporters against their colleagues in the NPP by other top-ranking party personalities when he was opening his mouth rather widely and carelessly. In the unlikely event of a clash between the NPP and the NDC, which the man charged with running the Ashanti Region, Kofi Poku Manu, is fanning, this buffoon of a minister should be held culpable. It is gratifying to note however that it did not appear that the NDC supporters took their minister�s word seriously, having been taken aback by such a rare call in a country which has had enough of clashes. When an unqualified minister seeks to please his employers through inordinate support for the ruling party, stupid and outrageous tendencies as exhibited in Kumasi during the NDC activity can be expected. That a certain Hajia Adisa Atta Commander descended on the Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly�s Chief Executive Officer during the NDC activity, underscores the unruliness of a party which has nincompoops such as the regional minister as the president�s representatives. God save this country.