LESSONS LEARNED FROM KENYA'S ELECTION

Kenyans now know who leads the country the next five years. Uhuru
Kenyatta has been declared the winner, the opposition has raised
issues against the process but all the observer groups have described
the election, free and fair. The election dominated media discussions
in Ghana and Ghanaians were caught up in the Kenya elections fever.
This evening on one of Accra's popular radio stations, a popular radio
host working with the station, told his co-host that he saw Uhuru's
victory coming and did not hide his support for the victor. This was
what he told his co-host "I was in Kenya two years ago and per the new
infrastructure i saw, I knew the people will retain him to continue
what he is doing". The intriguing aspect of this statement by the host
is that, he was one of the journalists who confidently supported the
Npp anti- infrastructure campaign message. So, I quickly went back to
that article the Kenyan journalist wrote in which Mahama was lauded
for reducing Ghana's infrastructure deficit.My research did not end
there, I picked Prof. Ransford Gyampo's write-up and critically
scrutinised the content. After that, I read over and over again, what
Prof. Baffour Agyemang-Dua is purported to have said on a GTV
programme. Later in the day, I had a chat with Prof Elvis Asenso on
the Kenyan election and this time, he buried his partisan inclination
and dealt with the issues dispassionately. What he said should have
gladdened my heart but beloved, I sighed heavily after chatting with
him, and said to myself ; "the time has come for some of us to depart
from the rigid partisan stance we take on critical national issues" I
salute all these noblemen of the land for exhibiting maturity and
genuine spirit of patriotism.

I chose the above heading because of what we all heard and read from
Kenya prior to the elections. Kenya's national security instituted
measures to monitor activities of the various parties and prevented
suspected hackers from entering the country.I have my personal issues
and suspicions about the 2016 election results in Ghana but that have
decided never to make that part of the reasons why the NDC lost for
strategic reasons. My position is that, we must accept the result as
the verdict by the masses, go to their appeal court with our new
message, and respectively, appeal to their subconscious instincts for
their votes. What happened in Kenya, the deportation of the Serbians
and Ukrainians and other persons from Ghana, confirms what others said
about Ghana's election that, our system was hacked. Before the
elections, we witnessed emergence of a campaign strategy whereby a
candidate ( Nana Akufo-Addo) often supported behind the scenes foreign
communication strategists, cast doubt on the integrity of the
electoral process and the institution that manage it. The attacks on
the EC were designed to weaken the institution and make it vulnerable.
They issued threats and warnings and made all Ghanaians aware they
were going to take advantage of vulnerabilities in the process to
either declare themselves winners, or derail or establish lasting
doubt about the legitimacy of the outcome. So I asked my friend who
always challenged my position that the 2016 election was rigged
through hacking of our system, if he heard about the information the
Kenyan security released about the Ukrainians, the Serbians and the
deportation of the two Ghanaians and their Liberian counterpart.
I referred my friend to the decision by the authorities in the
Netherlands to abandon electronic vote counting in favor of old
fashioned methods following reports of foreign interference in other
countries' elections.We heard about the Serbians who were brought down
without the knowledge of Afoko and Kwabena Agyepong, and the Nigerians
who came down weeks before the elections.

KENNEDY AGYEPONG AND THE VIGILANTE GROUPS-

Ken, openly threatened the npp that he will expose how the npp won
elections if they dared remove the BOST boss. The vigilante groups
have repeatedly sent same message to the party. What are they hiding
from the public

CAMPAIGN MESSAGE

The opposition in Kenya made economic hardship one of its main
campaign messages and despite the economy growing on average of 5% a
year and foreign Investment increasing, the opposition using its
conduit forces, said Kenyans are not feeling the effect of the growth.
Uhuru's administration was also accused of excessive borrowing and
just like what the Npp told Ghanaians, NASA, said, Uhuru's government
has borrowed much more than the accumulative amount borrowed by all
past governments since independence. Kenyatta and his party,however,
argued that investment in infrastructure will spur growth.

The issue of corruption also featured prominently in their campaign.
They used John Githongo an anti- corruption crusader in the media to
attack Uhuru's government. John Githongo, described the Uhuru
government as "the most corrupt in Kenya's history" Uhuru just like
John Mahama, took did act, he suspended and eventually removed five
ministers and other high ranking officials in his government over
corruption. But the opposition mischievously misinterpreted his
action. The other message was the issue of unemployment. The
opposition adopted the strategy the Npp used to weaken the electoral
commission. It constantly expressed its reservations about the
commission's neutrality, efficiency and readiness to conduct a
credible elections.
In Ghana, we were treated to an exhibition in the art of guile and
deception every time the opposition elements mounted the campaign
platform and even seemingly honest and well respected personalities in
society, after setting foot in the exclusive lies peddling campaign
platforms, transform rapidly into liars or Rottweilers.

AFTERMATH OF GHANA'S ELECTIONS

So, let me land on what the radio host said about Uhuru and the
massive infrastructure recorded under his administration and what Prof
Baffour Agyemang-Dua, said about Mr Mahama and Ghana's infrastructure.
The world bank and other international institutions have made it clear
that unless Africa reduces its huge infrastructure deficit, real
economic growth will remain a mirage. Our economists and political
lords are aware of this obvious truth yet, remained mute when the npp
told the last administration that we don't eat infrastructure. The US
and other countries have scrapped the trainees allowance system to
expand infrastructure etc, Saudi Arabia and other countries have
removed certain subsidies their citizens hitherto, enjoyed and have
introduced new taxes to compensate loss in revenue as a result of the
fluctuating oil price. What are we seeing here, government is
suffocating itself with certain outmoded policies whilst reneging on
promises they made in opposition. The previous regime built more
hospitals and other health facilities, employing people to work at
these facilities is becoming a burden for the administration.
Fertiliser which were distributed "free" to farmers is now being sold
to them. Nigeria is going through same stagnation after Goodluck
Jonathan had propelled the economy to an appreciable level.

We shall continue with the discussion but my humble appeal to all is
that, the interest of Ghana must always come first and we must also
think of the generation to come. Let us use every platform we control,
profitably for the interest of mother Ghana.