Posted
on: www.dailyguideghana.com
By
William Yaw Owusu
Saturday,
July 08, 2017
The troubles of former Minister of Transport, Dzifa
Aku Attivor, are beginning to resurface following a call by colleague
opposition National Democratic Congress (NDC) member that she should be
prosecuted and possibly jailed.
Bismark Tawiah Boateng, the Eastern Regional
Chairman of the NDC, says he does not understand why Akufo-Addo’s New Patriotic
Party (NPP) government is allowing the former minister to walk freely when she
has a case to answer in the infamous bus branding saga that sparked heated
political debate.
The NDC Chairman told Okay FM in Accra that Madam
Attivor needs to be invited by the new government without delay to explain
issues surrounding the branding agreement that was reached between the Ministry
of Transport and actress Sellasie Ibrahim’s Smarttys Management and Productions
Ltd for the branding of 116 Metro Mass Transport (MMT) buses at a staggering
cost of GH¢3.6 million.
The branding had become a wasted exercise with the
defeat of John Mahama, who apparently wanted to use it to gain electoral
advantage as his picture and those of past presidents of Ghana were embossed on
the buses, with only his portrait appearing in full colour.
“You see some of these things contributed to the
party’s (NDC) defeat, but nobody paid attention to it,” Mr Tawiah Boateng
noted.
According to the NDC guru, the NPP government should
be bold enough to invite Madam Attivor for questioning and not entertain the
fear that the government will be accused of witch-hunting its political
opponents.
“The Nana Addo government should not tell us that
because of witch-hunting they will let her go scot-free. No! She should be
invited by the NPP government and explain to Ghanaians issues about the bus
branding,” he urged.
Sometime in April, 2016, Dzifa Attivor, who had
resigned as Minister of Transport following the GH¢3.6 million bus branding
scandal, at an NDC public rally at Aflao in the Ketu South Constituency,
entreated the people of the Volta Region not to vote for the NPP in the
December elections because it (NPP) has a track-record of putting Ewes (people
from the region) in jail.
She said that the previous Kufuor administration
specifically jailed former NDC appointees, who hail from the region and went on
to mention some of them as Dan Abodakpi and the late Victor Selormey.
She stated that if the NPP won the December
elections, it would repeat the same thing by jailing only Ewes, including
herself.
“When the NPP came to power in 2001, a lot of our
people were sent to prison. Victor Selormey, Dan Abordakpi and so on were
imprisoned. Was it because no other persons committed crime in Ghana? But it
was only Ewes that they jailed… I want to entreat you not to do anything for
Fifi Kwetey and I to go to prison. It lies with you all to ensure that no Ewe
person goes to prison. So I am pleading with you to work hard and deliver the
120,000 votes target for the party in the constituency,” she was quoted as
saying.
Dzifa Attivor’s comment sparked heated political
debate, with some opinion leaders and personalities, including former President
Jerry John Rawlings, condemning her.
In late October last year – in the heat of the
electioneering campaign – Tawiah Boateng, who is calling for the prosecution of
Madam Attivor, had said he anticipated tough times for NDC appointees, should
the party lose the elections which it eventually did.
The apprehension among some elements of the then
Mahama-led NDC administration over the possibility of then opposition leader
Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo becoming president became visible when Mr Tawiah Boateng
said plainly that the NPP should not be voted for because the opposition leader
was capable of jailing them.
But this time round it’s the NDC top man who is
calling for the prosecution of his fellow party member.
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