Jon Benjamin is the current British High Commissioner to Ghana. Once again, he was in the news for making an unacceptable remark about our President as he links it to the appearance of the Harmattan. He said “Oh, that nasty air outside all of a sudden. Did someone inaugurate the Harmattan already?”.
If Ghanaians nicknamed their President the Commissioner General leading to and even beyond the election as he inaugurates many projects, it does not mean any diplomat can go public ridiculing our President. A weather phenomenon has nothing to do with inauguration. The word, inauguration, gives his implicit intention away and the furor it generated to put him where he belongs nonviolently is justified. But Manasseh Azure thought otherwise, to the point of writing a piece, which to a large extent is a defense of the British Commissioner’s act.
In his piece titled, “the undiplomatic diplomat and the hypocrites”, Manasseh went describing Ghanaians who descended on Ben as hypocrites. In fact, Manasseh filled his piece with so much specious reasoning that, at first, you might think he has a point if you know nothing about smokescreens in advancing a case. Smokescreens are deliberate introduction of certain legitimate points anachronistically intended to conceal the specious reasoning for the advancement of a case, that would ordinary not make it.
In this regard, he used our internal wrangling and if they sway you, you are likely to see nothing wrong with what the British High Commissioner’s comment. And then tell yourself that Azure was simply being objective. However, as I shall point out, he only engaged in erecting smokescreens. Manasseh was more subjective than objective. Let me quote from his article for illustration.
THE SMOKESCREENS
“This is the presidency under which the senseless and fraudulent bus-branding contract was awarded. This is the presidency that supervised the SADA rot. This is the presidency that attacked and destroyed the voice recorder of a journalist and when a petition was submitted to get the official sanctioned and have him apologise, nothing came out of it”.
Further down the lane, “this is the presidency who told ministers not to accept a pesewa or a pin from a business entity but went ahead to accept a Ford Expedition from a Burkinabe contractor who was winning questionable contracts in our republic”. And many more in the article. These are diversionary tactics, which sway you off the main topic of discussion, in this case, whether the British High Commissioner’s comment clearly impliedly ridicules our President or not.
BEGGAR DESERVES NO RESPECT
“Besides, before we compare ourselves with the UK and US and the other countries, which we often say must stay away from issues, we should know our relationships with them. Ours is a servant-master relationship. We go there to beg them for money. We beg because our government officials, businessmen and highly respected people have, since independence, been stealing our collective wealth and stashing them in offshore accounts and buying property in Dubai and the most luxurious places on the planet. Until we stop begging, we should not expect to be treated as equals”. And many more in the article.
A beggar deserving no respect is commonsense. And international relationships are certainly not anchored on commonsense. So that is very pathetic from a journalist in 21st century, where even a thief is to be respected and treated with dignity for the fact that he is foremost a human being, before his status as a thief. Let us apply the same to a nation, and ask how whether a nation that “begs” deserves respect or not? The sole point of sovereignty of a nation in international relations is respect whether any “begs” via their representatives or not. Every diplomat knew this to guide their actions and utterances if not every journalists.
CONCLUSION
Reading his article reveals so much smokescreens, contradictions and specious reasoning. He was not objective either. Objectivity is not the absence of bias as most people think. Rather it is the effort to minimize its influence. As Azure could not minimize his bias against President John Dramani Mahama led government, even with respect to this British Commissioner’s comment, he imported almost every unnecessary claims as smokescreens to defend the British Commissioner’s indefensible unacceptable remark whilst tagging those who think otherwise as hypocrites.
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