GRi Press Review 18 - 12 – 2000
NPP, NDC bare fangs
Atta Mills’ son becomes an issue
Inusah chased out of Mosque
10 billion cedis to buy NPP agents
The Daily Graphic / The
Ghanaian Times
Hearts, Africa Chanps at last/Hearts rule Africa Now
NDC pays for complacency on Dec. 7
NPP mortgages Ghana to Italian maifa
Kufuor gets big boost
50m cedis deposit demand by AG Dept may retard life business
NPP, NDC bare fangs
The Public Agenda reports that leading members of the NPP and the NDC have been meeting behind closed doors to revise their strategies to launch a final onslaught for the minds and souls of the electorate.
It however says some of the purported plans emerging from these meetings have already been denounced as dangerous and particularly worrisome is an alleged attempts to play ethnic groups against each other to win votes.
The ruling NDC, according to available information, last week held meetings that had the ethnic card at the top of its multi-pronged campaign strategy to win the elections.
Filtering reports showed that some members would want to drive a wedge between Akans and non-Akans especially electorates in the rural areas to frighten non-Akans into voting for the Vice-President.
The NPP swept all the urban parliamentary seats in the first round.
The paper states that an aggressive media campaign, seen as part of the grand tactic, has already started with stories of alleged attacks on NDC supporters from other ethnic extraction in the Ashanti Region, an NPP stronghold.
The alleged below-the-belt methods is said to have raised some concern, with Jake Obetsebi-Lamptey of the NPP and Mijie Barnor, a deputy general secretary of the NRP saying the NDC’s tactics will backfire.
“Ghana cannot afford to travel the tortuous and hazardous path of either election-related or tribally-provoked civil conflict as has been either consciously or unconsciously built into the NDC campaign plan. It is a recipe for disaster,” Obetsebi-Lamptey said with Barnor consenting that “the people will vote for a unifier”.
GRi…/
Atta Mills’ son becomes an issue
The Independent writes that family matters relating Prof. John Evans Atta Mills, Vice President and flagbearer of the NDC in the 2000 elections has become an issue in the presidential run-off.
The paper says at stake is the revelation that the flagbearer has a child aged 11, which is contrary to what his official bio-data published in the state-owned Daily Graphic and other papers since he emerged on the political scene.
“In all those biographies, no mention has been made as to whether he has a child,” the paper said.
The Statesman however made reference to his out-of-wedlock child in a publication few days to the presidential and parliamentary elections.
The wife of the Vice President, Naadu, according to a rumour mill objected to a step-son living with the couple who have no child of their won.
The State-owned Graphic had later confirmed Prof. Mills’ son, although an earlier statement from his office signed by his secretary, Willie Ansah, dodged the issue and rather spoke about the support and sympathies of some religious leaders over the issue.
The Independent says while J.A. Kufuor has not made the riddle about the Veep’s son an issue, it appears it is now in the media domain with people asking why the son had been kept out of official bio-data of Veep Mills and has only re-surfaced after press reports.
GRi…/
Inusah chased out of Mosque
The Ghanaian Chronicle reports that a timely intervention by Muslim elders saved the controversial Alhaji Inusah Issaka from being lynched at the Takoradi Central Mosque, where he attempted inciting the Moslems against the NPP.
Inusah, having made an unexpected appearance in Takoradi, presumably with President Rawlings who had flown in for a passing out function at the Air Force base, reportedly made an entry last Friday after their 1 o’clock worship.
The worshippers had been asked to wait because an important personality had come from Accra to address them.
Alhaji Inusah who said he was there to alert them about the inhuman treatment meted out to the Moslem community in Ghana by the NPP had hardly finished when an elderly worshipper lunged straight at him, seized the microphone from him, held his neck and attempted a slap.
The more youthful members in the assembly rushed on him but he was saved by the Mosque’s elders who whisked him away. He is said to have fled in a Land Cruiser to the Airforce base.
GRi…/
10 billion cedis to buy NPP agents
The Accra Mail says it has learnt from reliable sources that the NDC has released 10 billion cedis to be paid as bribes to NPP polling agents countrywide, especially in the constituencies that the NDC lost heavily, with Ashanti Region alone attracting 2.5 billion cedis.
Truckloads of bicycles and other goodies are said to have been already dispatched to the northern regions.
The Mail says an NDC source, worried about the implications of the rigging told it that polling agents are the targets and should therefore reject any food and drinks given to them on the day.
The source indicated that before settling on the dangerous game plan, a series of meetings had been held by the NDC top men to adopt effective measures to reverse the people’s decision to have a positive change in the country’s socio-political direction.
The plan, according to the source, mooted by the party’s general secretary, Alhaji Huudu Yahaya, has the Northern and Volta regions as the catchment areas where the active involvement of the Non-Formal Division of the Ministry of Education, 31sth December Women’s Movement and others have already been sought.
The officers of these organisations are reportedly going to be served with ballot boxes to be tended in on the run-off day.
The paper recalls the Electoral Commission’s admission that the over 10 million voters register is over bloated which gained substance in less than 7 million people voting in the December presidential and parliamentary elections.
GRi…/
The Daily Graphic / The
Ghanaian Times
Hearts, Africa Champs at last/Hearts rule Africa Now
Both The Daily Graphic and The Ghanaian Times carry front-page stories on Accra Hearts of Oak who become Africa's 2000 Champions in the CAF Champions League at the weekend.
"At long last they are the continental club masters, a title that they have unofficially arrogated to themselves for well over three decades," Times wrote about the new Africa lords who beat Esperance de Tunis of Tunisia 3-1 at the end of ninety minutes to clinch the title on a 5-2 aggregate.
"It marked a year of total fulfillment for Hearts who have also won the domestic League and F.A. cups, while ace marksman Emmanuel Osei Kuffour, crowned it all with two personal goals to win the CAF Champions League top scoring award with 10 goals," the Graphic stated.
The historic moment, witnessed by Ghana's Vice President, Prof. John Evans Atta Mills and CAF boss, Issa Hayatou, saw Hearts trailing 0-1 and had to wait agonisingly until the last 11 minutes before they pulled even and went ahead with two more goals to throw the nation into a frenzy.
The match was however full of drama, suspense, hold ups and send-offs, and the firing of tear gas by an over-enthusiastic police, which nearly marred an afternoon of good football.
More…/
NDC pays for complacency on Dec. 7
The Times reports on its political page that NDC running mate, Mr Martin Amidu, has said about two million of the party's voters did not exercise their franchise on December 7 due to complacency of those supporters who were over-confident and assumed that because the party won in two previous elections, it would again win.
Mr Amidu, who was speaking at Bimbilla during a courtesy call on the Nanumba traditional area, Atta Abarika, as part of his campaign for votes in the December 28 presidential run-off, also explained that most party faithfuls voted for different candidates because the NDC did not conduct primaries to elect its parliamentary candidates.
"What these supporters did, was pulling the ears of the NDC and the party had learn its lessons form these protest votes," he stated.
He urged all qualified and eligible voters of the party to go out and vote on December 28, saying he believes God has ordained the NDC to win for which reason, he did not allow the NPP to pass the mark.
GRi…/
NPP mortgages Ghana to Italian maifa
The Ghana Palaver writes that the NPP in its quest for power is ready to dine with the devil as it entered into an alliance with the infamous Italian Mafia.
"The party has agreed to give 'contracts' to organized international crime in return for funds, for the party's electioneering campaign," it said.
The paper, a mouthpiece of the ruling National Democratic Congress, says its investigations indicate that the Italians who visited the country this year and claimed to be members of Berlusconi's party are indeed high-ranking members of the Italian Mafia.
The Mafia have, reportedly been sending funds to the NPP using a most highly placed official of the Italian Embassy in Accra and flowing through the diplomatic bag of the mission.
The NPP, according to the story, on a couple of occasions used a decoy as was the case in which Kufuor's wife, Aba, travelled to Canada where she met with high-ranking members of the Mafia and returned with thousands of dollars.
The Mafia network, the paper says, includes the collection of funds from a base in Lome, Togo, where the dollars are changed into CFA francs, moved up through the high seas and delivered at Tema Harbour.
GRi…/
Kufuor gets big boost
The NPP News, the mouthpiece of the opposition New Patriotic Party, says Elections 2000 was given a historic dimension on Saturday when in a demonstration of unity in diversity, parties ranged against the ruling NDC, joined forces in a determined signal of a common struggle for positive change, during a rally organised by the NPP.
Presidential front-runner, J.A. Kufuor solemnly referred to the event as symbolic of a dream coming true while CPP’s Dr George Hagan conjured the unifying spirit of the United Gold Coast Convention (UGCC), which acted as the common platform for the anti-colonial struggle.
PNC Vice-Presidential candidate, Mr B.B. Ntim described the event as a manifestation of the party’s moral obligation to see to the ouster of the party which usurped power from it almost twenty years ago, while for the UGM’s Dr Charles wereko-Brobby, it was home coming, short and simple.
NRP’s Chairman, Peter Kpordugbe said by his party supporting Kufuor’s bid for the presidency, they were not voting for any kind of change, but a positive change.
GRi…/
50m cedis deposit demand by AG Dept may retard life business
The High Street Journal (HSJ) reports that there are strong indications that the 50 million cedis compulsory deposit the Accountant General's office is imposing on all life underwriting firms operating in Ghana before it could process and remit premiums of worker policy holder's to their respective companies may retard the growth of life insurance business in the country.
It said it learnt that majority of sales made by life insurance companies are from the civil service mostly teachers, the armed forces and the health sector.
Already, the firms and policyholders have started complaining of the cumbersome procedures the Accountant General's (AG) Department is taking them through.
The paper says it was told last week that the input forms and the authority note usage process has become too time consuming.
GRi…/