But strangely, at the same time the President was telling the whole world about that positive development, elements in his government, either working on his instructions or in furtherance of his parochial interest, were working with the Bureau of National Investigations to intimidate and cow into silence, Ghanaians who are critical of his administration.
Fadi Dabboussi, a Ghanaian-Lebanese pilot, journalist and author, was Friday arrested at the Kotoka International Airport by the BNI on his return from a trip to Lebanon for alleged offensive conduct against President Mahama.
His residence was subsequently ransacked by operatives of the security agency after he had been led there upon his arrest, with all copies of a book he has authored about politics and governance in Ghana, said to be very critical of President Mahama’s governance, and pushing for change in government, seized.
Mr Dabboussi, who has been abused with over 48 hours’ detention in BNI cells, did not threaten to kill President Mahama, whose assigns recently threatened to kill Supreme Court justices.
His crime is that he is a supporter of Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, the Presidential Candidate of the main opposition New Patriotic Party, as well as what some people describe as a fierce critic of President Mahama.
Ghana now has a President who feels threatened by a writer and critic but believes people who threatened to kill and rape judges were not threats to the nation and so caused them to be released from jail because he had compassion for them.
Every Ghanaian, irrespective of his political affiliation, has the right to freedom of opinion and expression. Faddi’s opinion is that President Mahama has failed woefully as a leader, having allowed the presidency to be tainted with bribery and corruption. And he expresses forcefully, this opinion in his regular writings about happenings in the country, something President Mahama and his functionaries are not happy about.
His needless arrest and detention by the BNI was just a means of showing him and others of his ilk ‘where power lies’, more especially because his critical writings are not directed at opposition leader Nana Akufo-Addo and others who are seen by the system as ‘enemies’ of the president.
Are they BNI not in this country? Are they not aware of the offensive publications being made on various platforms against many well-meaning Ghanaians by people who claim to be working for President Mahama?
Detaining an ordinary citizen in a BNI cell because he is critical of the President is not only retrograde but primitive. And this is where the latter-day apostles of free speech who were all over fighting for the release of the Montie 3 should stand up to be counted.
The arrest and detention of Fadi beyond 48 hours is a clear case of coercive use of state power to cow people into silence and inaction, especially as the nation inches closer to the critical moment of decision making on December 7 about the future of this country.
Ghanaians are yearning for a change of government because they want to save the nation from further devastation by the inept and corrupt Mahama government. No amount of intimidations and no extent of coercive use of state power can prevent Ghanaians from successfully executing the Change Agenda.