When Sammy Gyamfi became politically conscious and started doing NDC politics in 2017 thereabout, I tweeted my praise for his style.
Incredibly impressed by his verbal communication skills, I wrote about how the new kid on the block was going to add to the NDC’s stock of fine communicators. That was certainly how it seemed at the time.
Then the Mahama bloc put him up for a leadership position. Again, I tweeted that it seemed dangerously premature for him to be elevated to the position of National Communication Officer.
My opposition to that move was to the effect that there’s more to being a manager of the Communications Directorate than just being a talking head and that Sammy Gyamfi needed a bit more time to warm himself up into the role.
But the growing cult of Mahama would hear no such sniping. The schemers of Sammy Gyamfi’s installation and the puppet master knew exactly what they were doing. They needed a puppet and Sammy Gyamfi fits the bill.
It, therefore, came as no surprise when Mahama started unleashing him on his supposed enemies in the NDC. First, it was Allotey Jacobs, then Koku Anyidoho and now the Rt Hon Speaker- Alban Bagbin and the minority leader- Hon Haruna Iddrisu.
But wait a minute; what has the Speaker got to do with the events of 3rd March? What exactly did Bagbin do to betray the NDC? Can this incorrigible armchair critic tell us?
Something just doesn’t smell right. As a matter of fact, this totally smells like another hatchet job by the Mahama bloc to save their leader.
It is an open secret that this enterprise that Sammy Gyamfi has embarked upon is an exercise of parochial personal retribution of Mahama. It is also an attempt to have absolute control of the party structures. And more importantly, this is to put Mahama in a pole position for the party’s nomination ahead of election 2024.
John Mahama always needs a foil. It riles up his base because they cling to anything that diverges responsibility from Mahama over to someone else.
In this case, Hon Alban Bagbin and Haruna Iddrisu are the boogeymen.
This has always been his modus operandi: to pit people against each other and then stand aside while his lackeys do his deeds. And he stays clean and enjoys the limelight as ‘Mr Nice Guy.’
After a spotless 30-year political career, Alban Bagbin is being accused of all this misconduct now, by a neophyte whose political umbilical cord is yet to come off.
Is there a case that Sammy Gyamfi can spew such invectives and the party won’t crack the whip?
Leadership is silent about this clear case of anti-party conduct and yet they would have slithered their spineless way to issue suspension letters if others had gone that route.
The current state of affairs in the party shows there are no elders in the house. I mean, how could a national officer launch such a scathing indictment of the parliamentary group and the Speaker of Parliament without a censure?
For Sammy Gyamfi, he’s very keen to ride the vainglorious self-publicity wave. Oh yes, this slimeball with a soared ego would give you the illusion that he’s leading the charge for accountable leadership.
But everyone with a reasonable mind knows this is a ruse to shift blame – a perfect example of trying to transfer the quilt on someone else so you don’t have to admit who the real scoundrel was.
The entire party leadership doesn’t realize that their failures and stark incompetence are driving radicalism in the party. Instead of looking for a middle ground, they’re doubling down.
It’s frightening to think of the precedent this is setting going forward – Of course, when a national officer of a political party attacks the very structure of the party he’s overseeing for virtue signaling, sneering, or condescending, it makes it much easier for the rank and file to follow suit.
Next time, anyone in leadership can decide to throw tantrums and level bribery allegations against the entire minority leadership, and the party will still let them off the hook.
Too bad the party of Rawlings now hopelessly gone the way of fascists and confederates. I shall return!!
The author, Dela Coffie is a political activist, journalist, communicator and human rights advocate.