Ghana at a precipice, triggers of June 4th Uprising persist – NDC bigwigs send unanimous warning

Prominent figures of the opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) are united in their caution to the current administration led by Nana Akufo-Addo that the triggers of the June 4^th Uprising in 1979 are endemic under his rule.

The June 4^th Uprising was caused by what proponents say was widespread corruption, bad governance, frustration among the general public, indiscipline within the Ghana army, a general moral decadence among others.

Jerry John Rawlings, who led the revolt and later became the first President of the 4^th Republic, and his colleagues in the military blamed the leaders of the Supreme Military Council (SMC II) led by General Fred Akuffo for the woes of the country.

At a ceremony in Accra to commemorate the 42^nd anniversary of the Uprising, leaders of the NDC, founded by Mr Rawlings were unanimous in their caution to the Akufo-Addo administration to rid the country of similar triggers of the bloody uprising that ushered in the 4^th Republic.

NDC General Secretary, Johnson Asiedu Nketia, said the features of the National Security that existed prior to the Uprising, for instance, seems to share similar features with the current one.

“Today human lives no longer matter. What matters is to ensure that a government in power must have their way and they must remain protected. So instead of us paying taxes for the National Security to protect us from criminal elements, now National Security has converted into protecting government leaving us the citizens who pay the taxes to our fate,” he said at the commemoration.

National Chairman of the opposition party, Samuel Ofosu Ampofo, also expressed similar sentiments.

He cited the decision by the Chief Justice, Kwesi Anin Yeboah, to petition the General Legal Council to investigate a prominent lawyer for the NDC, Dr Dominic Ayine, over comments he made at an academic forum as a sign that the Judiciary has not been left out in the deterioration of state institutions under this government.

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Daughter of late former President Jerry John Rawlings, Dr Zanetor Rawlings, also urged Ghanaians to demand accountability, social and economic justice, inclusivity to ensure all the pillars of good governance are respected under the current administration.

“If indeed we are being governed by people who say they understand rule of law and the Constitution, then we must hold them to account by the very same laws that are meant to govern all of us.

“Not too long ago…under the PNDC era, some of the people who today are at the forefront of breaking our laws were the very ones pointing fingers at others and now that they have the power, it looks as though they are not able to stand up to their own ideals,” she said.

She added: “Now more than ever, we must be able to speak truth to power because if we do not we leave room for something that we cannot anticipate that we do not want. Those amongst us who are old enough to remember the conditions that led to the June 4^th Uprising have a bigger duty not only to inform the youth of what happened but also to hold the government to account and remind them of the slippery slope that led to us there in the first place.”

The Director of Elections of the NDC, Elvis Afriyie Ankrah, explained later during a radio programme, that while the party remains resolute in its observation that the triggers of the June 4^th Uprising are rife under the current government, it does not wish to see another uprising, nor does it intend to incite any person to take up arms against the state.

“Everything is possible but nobody is saying it and wishing it. We know that we are in a democratic era and there are democratic means by which we can deal with these things…Out of frustration, anything could happen. So, it is a caution.

"Anytime we celebrate June 4^th we say ‘never again.’ We caution those in leadership that please…we are saying that if the very things continue, God-forbid, but anything at all can happen,” he explained the unanimity of the NDC message to Ghanaian by its leaders.

He added that the ongoing #fixit campaign is a sign that the majority of the Ghanaian population are convinced that the country is headed in the wrong direction.

“Whether it will end like in Tunisia or like the Arab Spring nobody wants that to happen. But if we continue to play the ostrich in spite of all the signals that we are seeing: the economy is in a mess, the health sector mess; education, mess; security, mess; rule of law, mess and on top of that you are burning galamsey [equipment] and when people talk then you want to stifle them, then you are creating conditions that can lead to problems,” he told Accra-based Joy FM on Friday.

He concluded his submissions as follows: “As his Excellency, Dan Abodakpui said, ‘we are standing at the edge of a precipice.  If somebody is standing at the edge of a precipice what you do is to draw the persons attention to start taking steps backwards. If the person continues in that way the person may fall down the cliff and die.”