President John Mahama
At the time of composing this commentary, the President was being expected in the country after a successful private visit to South Africa.
The headline for this commentary was therefore cast on the assumption that he arrived yesterday evening as put out earlier.
Trust Ghanaians for their attempts at sieving the veracity from the mendacious stuff when it comes to statements emanating from politicians. While some believed it when the facebook stuff indicated that the Commander-In-Chief was in South Africa on a private visit and not for medical treatment, others thought it was a de ja vu affair, an attempt at veneering the real stuff.
In spite of the speculations regarding the President?s vacation schedule, we would stick to South Africa as the destination and not Francois Hollande?s France as some cynics sought to impress upon their compatriots.
Presidential X?mas vacation should be spent in style and so when our President decided to relish the largesse of the presidential office by travelling and remaining incommunicado during his absence, nobody should begrudge him.
For those already lobbying for positions even as the Supreme Court case is pending, the absence of the chief hirer and firer in the civil and public service was nightmarish. He was out of coverage area and therefore could not be impressed upon to consider those seeking juicy positions in the yet-to-be established government.
The Supreme Court?s action challenging the validity of the 2012 polls notwithstanding, the President had a fantastic vacation but not without questions bordering on the applications of the tenets of the Constitution and political convention.
This is the area which prompted a number of questions from those who eventually concluded that an unacceptable precedence has been set which for them breaches the constitution and convention.
Addressing these shortcomings would enhance our faltering governance order.
We discovered as did many Ghanaians that there was nothing like the swearing-in of the Vice President to act as Acting President when the Commander-In-Chief was away. It was such a serious security and constitutional breach that we are surprised it eluded media scrutiny.
There was no swearing-in activity of an Acting President in the person of Vice President Paa Kwesi Amissah Arthur nor a correspondence to the Speaker regarding the Commander-In-Chief?s private visit?
The all-is-well information from the President?s facebook wall and his vacationing with his wife and kids are all that we have been fed with.
Was the NPP?s march to the Supreme Court so unsettling that nobody even cared to pose the right questions? If the President finally arrived yesterday, we welcome him back.
