No Umbrella Or Elephant Here!

Ladies and gentlemen, today we want to think aloud on some issues.  I do not really have a position on anything, but I just want us to walk this issue in our minds.

This past week in the media, one of the major issues that had come up was a list of pastors, mainly respectable ones in our society (never mind the others), and the political parties they
“belonged” to. I believe it was the INDEPENDENT NEWSPAPER that first brought out this list.  Their basis for this was, “solicited views from some members of the general public on which men of God (they believed) belonged to which political parties”. My friends, let us give a standing ovation to this newspaper for such an outstanding effort which will bring respite to the many suffering Ghanaians. Hurray!

But I strongly believe they do not have photocopies of their party membership cards. And I will expand on that. You see, Bishop Dr Charles Agyin Asare, founder and overseer of Perez Chapel International,  was in the news just a few days after, insisting that he is not a card bearing member of any political party and wants the media to stop publishing such stories about him and other pastors. He spoke to JOY NEWS, saying, “I don’t have a party card. I don’t belong to any political party. I have heard other pastors say the same thing; that they don’t belong to any political party”. He goes on. “What the media is doing is dividing us… we've had various governments in power and we've supported them”.

You see, my friends; imagine you, sitting “your somewhere”; having worked so hard for so many years to excel in your field…and all of a sudden, BAM! You’re this, or that. You’re tagged. Forever and ever. Never mind what you’re doing. Never mind what you do in your day to day life to help people.

 Is this what Ghanaians have been reduced to? Either for this party or that one?  Every group split and identified. NPP NDC police, NPP NDC judges, NPP NDC students, NPP NDC media, NPP NDC pastors, NPP NDC populace!?

And in any case, who says these people do not have a right to be sympathetic to a particular group! Since when did it become a crime? So, my friends, the question that bugs me is, WHY!?  Why do we do these things to ourselves?

What people should get is this: Ghanaians (or the majority of them) are too big and too sophisticated to be just shoved into a political party hole. And anyone who doesn't understand this gravely insults us.

These pastors may have certain opinions on certain issues at certain times. But the time of tagging people; “he is NPP, he is NDC” is over! They are themselves: good or bad!

You see, one other reason this disturbs me so much is the amount of coverage this issue had. Some stations carried on their midday news bulletins AND even on their prime-time news on TV!

 I am more disappointed, that as Nation, these are the issues that when we wake up, our media houses put on our table to consume. Just like that! And we run with it…devoting time to it…because it is the breakthrough story of the year that will change the lives of thousands of Ghanaians and probably help us find a cure for cancer too. Hurray!

This is the agenda we put out to our citizenry…when the under privileged…the down trodden…the homeless… the hospitals without beds AND the newly passed out policemen sleeping in a workshop because of the lack of accommodation, are just hoping…just hoping that by some stroke of luck, their issues will be highlighted for them to get some help. But it was not to be. Our media was busy with more important things, matters of national importance: Which Pastors We Think Belong to Which Party. They absolutely have to find out. Inform and educate can wait.

I may be talking a bit too much but kindly allow me to talk to you about one more thing. The one that irks me most. You see, with these kinds of issues about who belongs to who or what, we are destroying our institutions of trust as a nation. Yes. Every nation must have them. Institutions which will have people listen when they speak. Institutions that everybody will respect. When they speak, we will listen, because we trust them. Yes! There ARE bad nuts who have abused this trust and sometimes become openly biased. But in general, the institution of the Church must be kept sanctified. This tagging of Men of God is too obvious and too needless.

Already we are busily bastardizing our judiciary. We have split the civil society into two along party lines. Our security services suffer accusations of bias based on political allegiance all the time. But now that we see that of the religious leaders coming, let us refuse it. Let us not allow these people to piss on the trees under which we all seek shade.