A: Introduction
I loved DCOP Kwesi Ofori.[1] He
was the most resilient public servant I knew in Ghana. Under one political
party’s reign, he was the face and voice of Ghana Police Service. Under another
party, he disappeared into oblivion, never to be seen or heard again. But as
sure as day follows night, he will come back. In one instance, I had almost
completely forgotten about his existence when an ill-fated youth fracas in a
community on the main Kumasi road to my hometown momentarily gave my man a
30-second appearance in the media. That was when I got to know he was then a
District Commander in the outback, far from his previous perch at the Police
Headquarters, Cantonments, Accra. Then a few years ago, a new political game
came to town and my beloved DCOP returned with a bang, carrying on as if he had
never been away.
Resilience aside, one other attribute
that endeared me to Mr. Ofori was his PR prowess. He had adequate and
appropriate grammar to answer every query and question about the Police
Service. Whether the subject was a policeman found embedded in a gang of
thieves, or extorting monies from the public on the highway, or arrested on
suspicion of attempted coup d’état, DCOP Ofori was always on hand to give a
fitting explanation or reply. His answers were always short, crisp and to the
point. He stuck to the script, no matter how pushy a journalist deigned to be.
The script was usually along these
lines: “The Police administration is a professional institution committed to
ensuring peace and security in the country. We take all security issues
seriously and, therefore, the IGP has ordered that investigations start
immediately. I wish to assure all stakeholders and the nation that, we are
doing our best to bring the situation under control. Any body found culpable
will be brought to book.” Simple and sweet.
B: The offending tweet
Thus, recently when the British High
Commissioner to Ghana tweeted, in a single sentence, about the arrest of an
activist,[2] it
was the expectation that the PR unit of Ghana Police will tweet in reply, if
necessary at all. After a day or two, no such tweet in reply came and we
thought that interregnum had come and gone with the ebb and flow of life. But
apparently, not.
C: The prodigious letter in reply
As it turned out, the IGP of Ghana -
the head triumphant - had this time decided, selected and elected himself to do
the deed. And the deed he did, indeed. It was a monstrous 4-page letter,
written and signed off by the Chief personally. Talk about a Caterpillar truck
set in motion to kill a ‘kakalika’![3]
For the avoidance of all doubt,
Chief’s Ph.D Degree was neatly tagged to his name in his letter-in-riposte, in
case anyone was in doubt as to how he came to know about the 1961 Vienna
Convention on Diplomatic Relations. Now, when Madam High Commissioner read
Chief’s massive missive, she was reportedly shocked at the reply her tweet,
which she considered harmless, had generated from the IGP’s desk, no less. She
is reported to have appeared on a TV programme to ‘explain’ herself.
D: The gender agenda
As if the 4- page monstrosity was not
bad enough, Chief also set down 15 questions for Her Excellency’s reflection
and self-education. Now, mark this. An accomplished woman, a career diplomat
who had risen to the rank of High Commissioner of Great Britain to Ghana (the
first woman to hold the position, I should add) was now a little girl, being
admonished to go and ‘reflect’ on lessons specially set for her by Mr. IGP.
Shorn of its pretense of conveying information on the need for peace in the
country, the IGP’s reply was very typical of the condescending and sexist attitudes in our social, professional
and general body politic in Ghana.
Since 1957 when we gained independence
from Britain, this is the first time a female High Commissioner has been posted
to Ghana. And this is the first time a High Commissioner has been attacked and
berated in this manner. So, please connect the dots. Craig Murray was here. Jon
Benjamin was here. Benjamin wore Ghana-made clothes and lived on Twitter as if
he was an ordinary citizen of Ghana. He tweeted about Presidents, ‘asofo,’
celebrities and ordinary citizens. He reveled in innuendoes in condescension.
Not a whiff was heard from any of the ‘subjects’ of his tweets. Other males
have come and tweeted and left with no fuss. So, what has changed this time?
Gender. How sad. A political commentator has been reported to have even added
that Madam High Commissioner must look for a Ghanaian boyfriend for herself.
Oh, yes. Where women are concerned, it can be that gross, rude and outright
disrespectful.
E: Lessons for My Lady and her diplomatic friends
My heart goes out to the High
Commissioner for such an unexpected turn of events. For such a simple tweet on
an issue that was already in the public discussion mill to generate such an
overkill of a reply must be truly traumatizing for her. But, Your Excellency,
welcome to democratic Ghana and the everyday life of the Ghanaian (and African)
woman. The speed with which you organized yourself to go on TV to tell your
side of the story means that, you were beyond perplexed. Unfortunately, for the
countless women who face such disparate treatment on a daily basis, they have
no access to the media and no support.
Ghana
has successfully handed over power from one government to another for three
decades. We are touted as Africa’s beacon of democracy. We are every western
nation’s star ‘pupil’ to cite as example for others to follow. We organize
elections, many more women form queues to vote for many more men to take
political power. And the men take fellow men to fill political positions and
form the ruling class. Of course, there is a sprinkling of women in Parliament,
as Ministers of State, as members of Boards of State institutions. Western
diplomats are happy to report back home that all’s well with the gender agenda.
With such reports sent back home,
western governments are more than happy to withdraw or, at best, drastically
reduce their funding for supporting women’s rights advocacy groups and
campaigns. In the 1990s and 2000s, women’s advocacy groups such as FIDA, AWLA,
Abantu, NETRIGHT, Women’s Manifesto, WiLDAF, etc. flourished because they
received funding to support their activities. DFiD, USAID, CIDA, Save the
Children Fund, European Union, UNICEF, UN Women, and many others, supported
them. These days, most of the women’s groups have collapsed for lack of
funding. They do not come out when women and children’s rights are under
attack. Patriarchy now reigns supreme. Even a Gender Minister in Ghana is not
spared the onslaught.
The Minister for Gender, Children and
Social Protection has reportedly been away from Parliament due to, according to
her, some pressing family issues. A male MP first called her out in the media,
blaming her for the ruling party’s difficulties in getting the required number
of votes in Parliament for Government business. Days later, a second male MP,
alleged to be a first-timer in the House (the Gender Minister is in her third
term!) also angrily berated the Minister in the media for her absence from
Parliament. Yet again, a third male MP, also took his turn on the airwaves to
tell ‘Madam Honourable’ his piece of mind.
As it turned out, the Gender Minister
was not the only absentee MP this side of the House’s term. Not one, but two
other MPs, including the first MP who came to castigate the Gender Minister in
the media for her absenteeism, were culprits of the same offense of
absenteeism. Strangely, the two MPs who deemed it their bounden duty to berate
the woman MP/Gender Minister said nothing about the two male MP absentees! Oh
yes, this is democratic Ghana where there are equal rights. Women’s rights
groups are either dead or dozing off so this young woman has to fight the
political establishment alone. Not a single diplomat has also come to her aid,
to the best of my knowledge from daily news headlines.
Not too long ago, two female
journalists had the rare pleasure of meeting in person, at a TV auditioning
show, a bloke who had developed a unique skill in insulting and bullying female
‘celebrities’ online. The lady journalists seized the opportunity to exact
their pound of flesh to their hearts’ full content on TV, to the joy and
admiration of many social media users.
Apparently, the boy’s disgrace on
national television felt like an assault on Ghanaian manhood. The patriarchs
would not let the ladies live as victors, of course. So they ‘organized’ for
the ladies and the boy to meet and patch up. Why didn’t they seek out the boy
and warn him to stop the foolishness when he was misbehaving under the cover of
social media anonymity? Not surprisingly, it is the same old ‘come and patch
up’ approach the Ministry of Foreign Affairs & Regional Integration adopted
in the IGP/High Commissioner situation. Instead of the Ministry to call out the
IGP that, for someone who cites the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations
with glee, his conduct was undiplomatic, they rather issued a half-hearted
letter with a promise to resolve the matter. Which matter is there to be
resolved?
F: Conclusion
So, Your Excellency, as we say in
Ghana, you have seen it “fiili fiili,”
to wit, ‘with your naked eyes.’ Or to sound more medieval, ‘in flagrante delicto.’ If, as a High
Commissioner enjoying diplomatic immunity, the head of a state security
institution can adopt such bullying and intimidatory tactics towards you, we
can well imagine what ordinary Ghanaian women go through every day. Who knows?
May be it was good omen that it happened this way to bring one of the main
challenges women face in Ghana – discriminatory treatment just because they are
women – to the fore.
Just as women’s rights advocacy has
died down, disparate treatment of women has shot up. We hope that this
unfortunate incident will help bring back women’s rights advocacy and training.
Considering that the IGP wears a perpetual picture-perfect smile, he might be a
nice person as his smile seems to suggest. He does not come across as the
smiling villain Shakespeare talks about in HAMLET. With some prepping in gender
dynamics, he, and others of similar high stock, will do better the next time
they find themselves in gendered situations.
FOOTNOTES
[2] A
Ghanaian lawyer and Ph.D student at Cambridge University, UK
[3]
‘Kakalika’ means cockroach in the Ga language.
