Dr. Nyaho Nyaho-Tamakloe, a founding member of the ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP), has stated that calling President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo on the phone to give him advice on important matters and then having Akufo-Addo reject the advice will drive him mad.
He said that, in contrast to President Akufo-Addo, who will not believe him, former President John Agyekum Kufuor always listened to him when he had suggestions for how to run the country
The two of them were key organizers of the 1995 Kume Preko protest against the Rawlings administration’s implementation of Value Added Tax (VAT).
In response to the question of why he won’t pick up the phone and contact Akufo-Addo to discuss matters affecting the nation, he stated to TV3’s Johnnie Hughes that “I know him very well, what will get me crazy is to take a phone, advise him, and he will not heed my advice.”
“Let me just fast-forward and give an example. When Kuffuor was elected president, the stadium disaster occurred soon after, on May 9, and I was not even in government at the time. He then formed a committee, and I believed a key figure from the North should have been a member of the committee, but she wasn’t.
“You know what I did; I took up the phone and called Kufuor. He answered it, and we spoke about the concerns. Kufuor, I told him, wasn’t the proper leader for the country at the time. He listened to what I had to say.
If I were to advise President Akufo-Addo, I would say, “If you want to build a cathedral, tell the people exactly what the cathedral will be used for. Also, let the people know that the cathedral will not be financed by the state and that it will be erected by you.
“That was our first exchange, but regrettably things are changing. The terrible part is that the clergy are in favor of this. If a person loses faith in their spiritual leader, that will be the end of this nation, so the clergy must come first. They ought to be able to tell Akufo-Addo, “That is what you told us from the beginning; go by it,” but they can’t.
Source: Mybrytnewsroom/Joseph Asare
