President J.A Kufuor

DO WE REALLY CARE?

If we admit, as it seems to be the case, that something is right as cited in Article 42 [of the Constitution], then the issue should not be how to put ROPAB on hold; it should rather be that in spite of the problems that seem to envelope it, how to advance and make that right achievable. We should always remember that there is nothing in this world that is smooth sailing. Even roses have thorns.

What we ought to be doing therefore is to cut to the chase and offer some illumination as to how to advance that right. To ask a section of our citizens to be patient and agree to the suspension or denial of their rights because we are incapable or incompetent at fixing it seems ludicrous, to say the least.

The connotative implication of the word patience means someone is suffering.

After 13 years of treading this democratic path we are still saddled with an inability to register those who have just turned 18. It is not that we are not capable, we SIMPLY DON'T CARE or think it important.

As our elders say, etua wo yonko ho a, etua dua mu! It is the manifestation of this crass and callous disregard which has become a national attitude that seems to be "hubbling" this Bill.

MP'S FREEBIES!

The newspaper makes the subtle, yet important point that our elected Members of Parliament can only cooperate when some freebies are being shared among them. Here is the problem! Nothing else is important, including the jobs they have been elected to do, and are being paid for is important, unless there is a very direct and immediate benefit for them. Otherwise, it can go hang. There is character being extolled for you.

PREVENTIVE DETENTION ACT

The argument of other bills not having been passed, namely, the Disability Bill, Domestic Violence Bill, Whistleblowers' Bill, Freedom of Information Bill, etc is non sequitur. Are we suggesting that there is a hierarchy of values and therefore of Bills to be passed? Do we not believe we can or should pass all these bills? Who determines which should come first? Can we not chew gum and walk at the same time? Here, if anything, we should be condemning the incompetence of Parliament rather than asking that their incompetence be accepted by putting anything on hold.

I would expect the patriotic citizen to take the whip and have a go at our Members of Parliament for their tardiness. Certain analogies have been made. The analogy of the PDA [Preventive Detention Act] and one party state are completely inappropriate, for the essence is clearly lost here. The Bills [PDA, etc] in question were enacted, without debate, and were aimed at constraining the rights and liberties of the citizens of Ghana.

The Bill before the House [ROPAB] is clearly open to debate, if the NDC is bold enough to engage in one. ROPAB seeks to restore and enhance the rights of the Citizens of Ghana, whose rights have been taken away.

CITIZENSHIP IDENTIFICATION

When the newspaper suggests that as far as it "is concerned fundamental issues of citizenship identification need to be urgently addressed to, not only, help us derive a more credible voters' register, but also help identify Ghanaians living abroad, in order to reduce the level of distrust likely to characterize going out there to register voters when we do not know how many people are out there", is it suggesting that the problem of citizen identification has hampered past elections or is a problem only for Ghanaians resident abroad.

The logical extension of this dubious argument would then be to suspend all future elections until the issue of citizen identification has been solved or properly dealt with. For, to continue to hold elections in Ghana while this problem is not solved, in the logic of the newspaper, should not be acceptable.

ROCKET SCIENCE

We are behaving as if this exercise is rocket science. It is not! Many countries from Italy, Senegal, Mali, Mexico, have all done it without fuss and chaos. It is only us in Ghana who want to make it into a big fuss and chaotic.

The weakness of the argument about there being 180 countries and our having only 50 foreign missions is palpable. Who said these exercises are only conducted through one's own foreign missions? When Mali conducted theirs in Ghana, they used the Electoral Commission of Ghana.

In the case of Senegal, in the US, they used various State Governments to help them get it done. In other words, there are legitimate means of organizing the task as many other countries have done before us. The obscurantism being shown simply belies an offensive attitude that has crept up on us as a people - our insensate ability and need to deny the rights of others so long as we have our share.

DECLARING PARLIAMENT USELESS

To the faux pas which says, "The best way for us to widen the right to vote is to first have a proper citizens' database, that would automatically let us know how many Ghanaians are eligible to vote", let me say this: let us suspend all future elections in Ghana until the proper citizens' database has been compiled. Once done, then we can resume holding elections in Ghana.

We have elected our representatives in a representative democracy to do work on our behalf. The various suggestions that either a National Conference or "wider" society should be convened to debate this clearly seems to suggest that we either have lost our meaning of representative democracy or are deliberately declaring Parliament useless.