I am a Citizen.
I rise to ask the OPPOSITION LEADER whether you have picked up signals from the military barracks that Akufo-Addo intends giving the military juicy salaries and allowances as well as attractive retirement packages?
Have you picked up signals of soldiers whispering and asking why the Military High Command is collecting the following personal information on every soldier?:
(1). Regimental/Service Number.
(2). Full name.
(3). Passport number.
(4). National Health Insurance card number.
(5). National ID card number.
(6). Personal phone contact.
(7). TIN
(8). Voters ID card number.
(9). Voting Constituency.
(10). Family lodging status for those above 1 (one) year in service.
Soldiers are whispering all over that President Akufo-Addo wants to buy their votes and silence with financial inducements.
According to the soldiers, President Akufo-Addo’s strategy of a piecemeal appeasement of the military includes a nice pay package as well as juicy terminal benefits.
“Included in the juicy compensation and benefits package, President Akufo-Addo is seriously considering allowing WARRANT OFFICERS to retire on their pay, with the possiblity of an extension to all ORs,” the soldiers whisper.
Ahooooo! Ahoooooyaya!!
Hey OPPOSITION LEADER, the soldiers whisper that they are not against enhanced renumeration for the men and women in uniform.
However, the soldiers expect that their Commander- in- Chief would pursue a more holistic and sustainable plan for their welfare.
They expect that such a plan would deal with the following concerns:
(1). Each soldier’s basic requirements of boots, uniforms and other accoutrements.
(2). Capital investments in:
(a). Accomodation.
(b). Hospitals and medical reception centres.
(c). Modern personal and crew-served weapons.
(d). Armoured vehicles for home use and peacekeeping missions.
(e). Aircrafts and ships for surveillance, patrols and monitoring, etc.
(3). Recurrent expenditure for salaries and allowances as well as terminal benefits.
And for the information of my respected Retired and Tired President Billy Akufo-Addo, your soldiers whisper that they are already aware of the failures of your highly deceptive, incompetent and corrupt government.
Your soldiers whisper that they have families, relatives and friends who live with their neighbours in communities, villages and towns; and they feel the impact of the policies of your government which serve the interests of only selected few among your family and friends.
Your soldiers whisper that nobody in the Ghana Armed Forces will be deceived by your vain piecemeal pay package when they realise that President Akufo-Addo dissipates the nation’s scare resources in hiring a jet at US$17,000 an hour to globe-trot (when a few hundreds of dollars would make the Presidential jet airworthy).
My respected Retired and Tired President Billy Akufo-Addo, your soldiers whisper that your intended pay package for the Ghana Armed Forces is not sustainable and that it is a ploy to saddle the next in-coming government with a huge wage bill like was done to the Mills government with the SINGLE SPINE SALARY.
Your soldiers whisper that your plan to buy their votes in the December 2020 elections with a juicy pay package is a vulgar display of recklessness.
Hey OPPOSITION LEADER, do you know that the former Liberian President, Charles King, is listed in the Guinness Book of Records for the most fraudulent election reported in history, having won the 1927 election with 234,000 votes in a country of 15,000 registered voters?
History repeats itself.
The TRAGEDY is for the OPPOSITION LEADER to be obsessed with so much fluffy noise and be caught up in the whirlwind of an inordinate ambition of becoming President that he stops thinking of basic, basic details of the game.
Little, little things matter if the OPPOSITION LEADER wants to win in a high scoring 9-8 match.
Some people know NANA AKUFO-ADDO fri tete during his lowly days of begging for support from TETTEH CONCA of HERTZ Ghana, Conca Engineering and Marina Hotel.
There is one thing they say they know Nana Akufo-Addo is not.
HE IS NOT A FOOL.
They say, he is as shrewd as SHYLOCK, and thrice as mean and vindictive!
Can I hear a loud clap offering from Mensah Otabil, Paa Kwesi Nduom and Kan Dapaah?
Pray and watch.
I Shall Retunr (sic).
Owula Mangortey
Odumase-Dodowa
31st December, 2019.
Note:
Where were you when the Rawlings coup was announced on 31st December, 1981?
I remember it was on a Thursday at about 11am. I was at the Accra Central UTC store buying whiteshirts, the prescribed uniform top for Sixth Formers of Adisadel College.