Les Elephants are Africa’s Best Hope

The World Cup will be contested in Africa for the first time and Soccer 365’s guest columnist Akyereko-Frimpong Manson tips the Ivory Coast as the team from Africa most likely to go far in the quadrennial tournament.

By Akyereko-Frimpong Manson

The Ivory Coast face an uphill task at the World Cup after being drawn into Group G, the ‘Group of Death,’ along with Brazil, Portugal, and the unknown but possible group walkovers North Korea. In their first World Cup appearance, Les Elephants failed to advance from the group stage in Germany four years ago but have the finest crop of players on the African continent and the managerial know-how in former England manager Sven Goran Eriksson.

Recently referred to as Africa’s perennial under achievers, Ivory Coast located in the western part of Africa shares borders with Ghana, another World Cup side, to the east, Liberia and Guinea to the west and Burkina Faso to the North. The over 20 million soccer crazy population follows Les Elephants with passion.

Ivory Coast, a war torn country is gradually patching its way back to socio-political and economic stability. A feat that is hugely grateful to football. Top soccer icons like Didier Drogba Yves Tebily, Manchester City’s Habib Kolo Toure, and Emmanuel Eboue of Arsenal have been able to unite the Ivorian people with football and succeeded where the state politician failed to succeed.

Les Elephants have been able to calm down nerves and eventually bring peace to the country through entertainment at the Stade Félix Houphouët-Boigny. But what have always eluded them are laurels on the pitch. After snatching the African Cup of Nations from under the noses of Ghana in Senegal eighteen years ago, Ivory Coast have struggled to reach the medal zone of almost every competition they participate in from youth level to senior national team side.

Four years ago, the country sealed a historic world cup qualification to Germany along side of neighbors Ghana and Togo but failed to make their impact felt in a watertight group that included Argentina, Netherlands and Serbia and Montenegro. Les Elephants under French legend Henri Michel finished in third place after comprehensively beating group whipping boys Serbia and Montenegro 3-2. The attacking potent of The Elephants scored in every single game against all three teams in the group phase but conceded a goal more than what they netted.

But that result did not carry over to future tournaments as they placed fourth in the CAN two years later in Ghana after loosing 4-2 to the host in Kumasi.  And qualifying for South Africa did not come on a silver platter; an enterprising Burkina Faso side almost stood their way. Les Elephants needed to stop the Stallions at the Stade Félix Houphouët-Boigny to finally book their ticket.

An unstable technical team has vastly affected the progress of the team. Bosnian trainer Vahid Halilhodzic was booted out after an unsuccessful tournament in Angola in January. Demolishing Ghana 3-1 in their opening game, Les Elephants gave promise of winning a major trophy in almost two decades with a star-studded side.  Again the story could not change, another contender in South Africa, Algeria produced an inspiration performance to fight twice from behind to thrash them 3-2 in extra-time in the knock out stages of the tournament.

Group G at this year’s World Cup has been ballyhooed as the ‘Group of Death,’ and will showcase some of the tournaments top talent such as Brazil’s Kaka, Portugal’s Cristiano Ronaldo and of course the Ivory Coast’s own Didier Drogba set to illuminate the soccer stage in a colossal fashion.

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In preparation to equally meet the challenge and match Brazil and Portugal boot for boot and maybe disintegrate group underdogs Korea DPR, 62-year-old former England manager Sven Goran Eriksson who took up the appointment last month has a strong provisional 30-man squad which would be slashed down to 23 by June 1. 

The Swede has a big headache in selecting his final men from a squad that consist of vastly experienced players from most of Europe’s top club. The only local players making Les Elephants squad include two goalkeepers from the country’s biggest club-ASEC Mimosas; Vincent Angban and Daniel Yeboah a Ghanaian who has naturalised for them. Danger-men Arthur Boka of VfL Stuttgart, Aruna Dindane of Lens who played majority of the season with relegated premier league side Portsmouth, chief tormentor Kader Keita of Galatasaray, and Chelsea duo of Didier Drogba and Salomon Kalou are just enough for the Ivorians to be plucky in South Africa.

With all the talent on the field at his disposal, the challenge rests on the shoulders of Eriksson who should work to produce a more cohesive team to lift their status in the global arena. The Swede gaffer is maybe relishing a massive demolishing of Korea. He will have the chance to understudy the style of play of the Asians by attempting a friendly with another Asian giants and a group E member Japan on June 4 eleven days before their opening game with Portugal at the Nelson Mandela Stadium in Port Elizabeth.

The opening game with Portugal on the 15th will be key for Les Elephants. Eriksson’s must have a positive result in that game to boost their morale for the subsequent games with Brazil and Korea DPR on the 20th and 25th respectively.

With as much talent as any side and a desire to improve on recent results, Les Elephants are Africa’s biggest hope in South Africa and the continent’s bet for glory.
SOURCE: soccer365.com

DRAWBACKS OF THE USES AND GRATIFICATION THEORY

From the Website of the University of Twente, Uses and Gratification Theory explain the uses and functions of the media for the individual, group and society in general. There are three objectives for developing uses and gratification theory. First, how individuals use mass communication to satisfy or gratify their needs, secondly, to discover underlying motives for individuals' use of the media and lastly to identify the positives and negative consequences of individuals media use.

According to Aber.ac.uk, Uses and Gratification Theory originated in the 1970s as a reaction to traditional mass communication research emphasing the sender and the message, stressing the active audience and user instead.

In Uses and Gratifications Theory, individual control consumption according to conscious goals.If the assumption holds and its true, then it means that the individual consumer maybe at risk as to the media content he/she decides to consume and the media cannot have a proper control over its audience or readership in the society thereby failing to fulfill its obligation as the watchdog of the society. Let's say audience have the power to choose which media content they would like to consume and the content being pornography or movies exhibiting radicalism, the consumer is exposed to get involved in social vices which in the short run affect society.
The argument that the public can choose the media content they want to consume is wrong. Any media item put before the public by the media has it target audience so any item the public consume plays part of the agenda setting of the media and there the public no hand in determining what issue or media item the media put in the market.

References
University of Utrecht website address http://www.cw.utwente.nl/theorieenoverzicht/Theory%20clusters/Communication%20and%20Information%20Technology/Uses_and_Gratifications_Approach-1.doc/ Explanation of Uses and Gratification Theory
Aber.ac.uk, http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/short/usegrat.html. Extract for the origin of Uses and Gratification theory
Aber.ac.uk, http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/short/usegrat.html#D Extract for the criticism of the Uses and Gratification Theory

CRITICISMS OF THE AGENDA SETTING THEORY

Agenda Setting Theory of the Media is the relationship between the salience of a story and the extent to which people think these issues are important. McCombs and Shaw(1972) uses three basic thesis to explain the agenda setting theory as used by the media. First of all they told that news agenda by the media determines public agenda, secondly explain that the agenda setting theory enable us to locate cues as to where we should focus attention, and lastly hold that the media do not tell us what to think but rather they tell us what to think about.

The Media agenda theory basically explains how the media pays attention to certain issues while neglecting others as if they are not important. The media therefore concentrate on few issues and topics that lead that lead the public to perceive those issues and subjects as important than other issues. The media does this through their editorial policies, media selection and the filtering process to create shape for reality.

The media agenda setting theory shows that news agenda by the media affect only some people, on some issues, of some time. This means that if the media decides to put a political issues in the media, is going to affect only people who are interested in political issues in a political season. For instance should  Joy FM and other radio stations with considerable amount of audience decide to put the NPP flagbearership race into the news and make it their agenda, it is going to to affect only people who are NPP supporters and will be out of news when the political season comes to a close.

Once the media have the power to decide what should be at the center of the public attention and action, the media may put issues they have a particular interest and put in the public agenda. This may result in selfishness and the media not living to serve the interest of the masses and its analysis and interpretative function to the society. The public mostly do not consider the salience of an issue put in the public domain by the media. The media decided what the public should think about and the public do not take time to consider the relevance of an issue put before them by the media.

References
McCombs and Shaw(1972) explanation of the Agenda Setting Theory of the Media

THE HANDSOME RACE

Some weeks back, Comrade Kwasi Pratt Jr. unleashed a scathing attack on former President Kuffour with regards to the selection of flagbearer for the New Patriotic Party. Mr. Pratt used certain words which are absurd in nature, indecent in manner and undesirable in content to merit posting on this blog.
Mr. Pratt is on a wondering spleen as to why former President Kuffuor prefers Allan Kyeremanteng to Nana Akuffo Addo. He does not understand how Mr. Kuffuor thinks and used the platform offered him by the Osagyefo Hall of GIJ to describe Mr Kuffuor's thinking as nonsense and intellectually naive. This thing happened some few weeks. The reason why it has taken me this long to criticise my favourite socio-political commentator is simple, I wanted to critically analyse the situation and delve deeper into the issue and come out with in-gullible and digestible facts that are not reducible to nothingness.
I think my mentor had it wrong here. His judgments were as incorrect and wrong as anything. Some of my mates in political science class always tell me Kwesi lacks introspection in his analysis which I have always refuted and never admitted on any occasion that Kweku Baako Jr. is better than him. Anyway, that for me is an arid abstraction and dialectically inapt.
Facing facts and reality we ask the question, How many Ghanaians vote on issues? How many of the Ghanaian population can critically analyse the competence of a candidate before going to ballot box? How many of us are educated in Ghana and know even their constitutional rights? These are the issues that matter in Ghanaian politics and they are as indelible as anything we can think of. Until we go through a new paradigm where the thinking scope will be reshaped and people better understand issues of politics and representation, THE HANDSOME RACE will reign supreme and people who think they are educated and so they should force every homo sapien on the face of the soil in Ghana to think the way they do are getting so many things wrong.
For example, my 75-year-old mother in Sunyani will only vote for Atta Mills because my brothers are staunch NDC guys and tell her to do so or vote for Jerry Rawlings because he is a mulatto and very pleasant in appearance. It will be work of miracle for my mother to understand politics and vote on issues come 2012. The interesting but sad thing is, my mother is not alone. About 60 to 70 percent of Ghanaians are in this same dilemma.
So if a political party wants to wield political power in Ghana and not in an advanced western country, it’s a simple philosophy; face reality and throw your theoretically based intellectual selection processes to the dogs. That is what Mr. Kuffuor did though no man in Ghana can provide a testimony that Mr. Kuffuor is recorded on any platform declaring his support openly for Alan Kyeremanteng. Akuffo Addo feels the NPP flagbearship is his personal entitlement and that no one has the guts to contest with him. That is a wrong notion and NPP adherents must reject that claim and vote for Alan.
Here is an ugly bald old man flexing muscles against young handsome intelligent man. This is THE HANDSOME RACE. God has gifted Ghanaians a sense of beauty and pleasantry. Even some guys say i am handsome and sometimes i laugh at myself when i take a look at my photograph, I look like a gollum but they say i am a beautiful guy. Never think I am grammatically wrong for using beautiful to describe a young man. Enough of that,
The issue now is Akuffo Addo has been a foot soldier for so long that he thinks he must become a president, I like the man's vim and vigor. He always put me in a verbal gymnasium whenever I listen to him. I like his antics but the hard fact is becoming a good speaker does not mean you must become a president. May be and just may be, he is destined to be a foot soldier because he is like Abdoulaye Wade of Senegal but he is so unfortunate Ghanaians do not accept people like Abdoulaye Wade onto our Presidency. We do not want a situation where Zimbabwe will be brought to Ghana. A Zimbabwean tagged Mr. President Mogabi the thick-headed and he had to go through hell for that comment. I know short people do not have heart to tolerate.
Back on track sorry I was getting mad with my crazy perceptions about Akuffo Addo.
NPP can do a simple thing to reclaim power in 2012. VOTE for a handsome young good looking Alan Kyeremanteng and they will regain control of Ghana one more time. Because many indeterminate voters will vote for them, because many illiterates NDC supports will voted for them and my mother and myself will vote for them.

YOU CAN ADD YOUR VIEW, THOUGHT, OPINION, ASSERTION AND COMMENT ABOUT THIS ARTICLE ON THIS BLOG. PLEASE LETS HEAR FROM YOU. 

Source:Akyereko Frimpong Manson Emmanuel(GIJ)

He Is Something Else

In 2007, the CPP’s congress elected Dr. Paa Kwesi Nduom to lead the party's presidentship capture ambition. A lot of things went through and the CPP campaign thrill went all over the nation. It was a rejuvenated CPP that some of us as young adults saw for some times. The CPP have been sluggish and their campaigns were not patronised by the masses as seen for NDC and the NPP. Nduom organised the CPP into a more vitalized and attractive political party that made some of us thought that at least for the first time, there was going to be a real litmus test for the dominant duo of NDC and NPP and that their duopoly was on the verge of crack down. To my utter consternation, the CPP was trotting behind and was millions of miles away from victory. The race was between NPP and NDC which was subsequently won by then candidate Mills. But something interesting happened that I always love to ponder over and analyse. It is not the reason why Nduom did so poorly in the 2008 election but rather study Paa Kwesi’s political ideology and determine whether he is fit for the CPP? And also ask whether he betrayed his own party's ideology and party?
In 2001, after failing to scrap victory for the CPP in the Komenda-Edina-Eguafo-Abirem constituency, Paa Kwesi assumed a political office with the Kuffuor led NPP administration. He justified his action by stating that he is a man of all inclusiveness and that all inclusive government gives everybody the chance to serve the nation, adding that the all inclusive government of President Kufuor has won for him and the nation a lot of credit and goodwill from governments and international institutions worldwide.
This move attracted scathing criticism from some vociferous elements within the CPP and some socialist journalist such as Comrade Kwasi Pratt Junior.
In a TV interview on "Good Evening Ghana" Metro TV, Prof. Agyemang Badu Akosa stated that the CPP is fine but it chose the wrong leaders at the 2007 Congress; a one-man show campaign in 2008 led to disastrous results for the CPP; that the whole CPP 2008 campaign was a media hype; that there was a disconnection between the Flagbearer and the constituencies; and that the party will go to Congress soon to elect better executives to re-organise the party.
In a personal chat with Prof. Agyemang Akosa at a forum organised by the Ghana Socialist Forum, he revealed
“I am going to contest for the flagbearership of the CPP, Nduom was unfit and there was so many things done wrongly, we are going to put the right things in place and ensure that we package the CPP to make more to attractive to the youth and the people of Ghana. Nduom let the party down ideologically; he is not a real party man."
This says enough about the infightings going on in the CPP and I believe that those involved are power intoxicated individuals who want to wield political power but nothing else.
Here, I pose my two worrying questions again. Did Paa Kwesi Nduom’s decision to join the NPP constitute betrayal and disloyalty to the CPP? Were his reasons tangible and should they be accepted?
Very soon the CPP will head for national congress to elect its flag bearer for the 2012 election.
My position on their flagbearership is implicit from within and explicit from without.
Nduom is something else!
Supposing the CPP happen to live in a Nigerian Political atmosphere, and I am a strong party man like former President Olusegun Obasanjo, I will boot Paa Kwesi out of the party and hand-pick Prof. Akosa like Obasanjo solely chose sick prone president Alhaji Musah Y’ardua. Never think I am trying to preach dictatorship or some form of rulership based on exploitation and inhumanity. I am never for that. I believe in a system where there is equal treatment and enjoyment for each and everyone in a society. I advocate a classless society. But towing the line of truth and credibility, that is what should be done to move the CPP from wilderness and to its destined political and ideological status. The CPP cannot continue to remain in the hands of charlatans, sycophants and power-drunk individuals who want to aggrandize popularity through the CPP because they cannot match the competition elsewhere. It is very sad that these misfit individuals have mingled their ways to the top hierarchy. They think there are not enough forces within the party and so with the slightest effort they can achieve national recognition. Dr. Paa Kwesi Nduom has embarked on numerous salient ventures that deserve nothing but commendation. He might have achieved a lot of laurels from that angle. Fair enough, he is well known. But this thing has always worried me about Paa Kwesi; I cannot come to terms with my conscience as to why this honourable gentleman has embarked on a course to ideologically impersonate-trying to be who he is not. Just last week, our Political Science lecturer introduced to us a new topic, IDEOLOGY!
Delving deeper the realms of ideology, he mentioned capitalism, socialism, fascism, Marxism and a lot more. The study group I belong to was asked to make research on fascism yet I was enthralled to read and learn something about capitalism and socialism and just read on fascism for academic purposes. After comparing tenets and concepts of these two competing systems, I came to understood that Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, the first president of Ghana and the founding father of this land was a staunch advocate for socialism and used the concept to achieve a lot of unimpeachable and various degrees of success for the country. He used the system to put rudimental infrastructure and provided the nations’ most basic needs. Ghana really flourished. Dr Nkrumah saw capitalism as too Western and that the ideology was not viable on the African soil. And even if was going to work, it needed to go through some genetic re-engineering of a sort to make it adaptable in the African political atmosphere.
In one of his famous writings “Neo-Colonialism, Last Stage of Imperialism”
Dr Nkrumah justified his care for the people and the reason why he favoured socialism and dismissed paradoxical exploitive oriented capitalism.
“In a socialist state, government represents the peasants and the people. In a capitalist state, government represents the exploitative class”
There was no way Dr Nkrumah was going to allow the West to hide behind capitalism and exploit his people. Such was the legacy of the man who formed the Convention People’s Party-the first political party to win independence on African soil; this is what Nkrumah left behind for his followers. And like Jesus told his disciples, go round the world and preach the gospel according to Jesus Christ to the rest of the world and nothing less nothing more. The move Paa Kwesi Nduom took to join to a capitalist party which I will write about in my subsequent works is a pure betrayal and infidelity of higher class to the philosophy of the CPP.
I tell you! Kwame Nkrumah shook in his grave and still sends a message to us, to banish people like Paa Kwesi Nduom out of the CPP. The CPP has a tradition, the CPP has a culture, the CPP has its values, the CPP has its way of life that is supposed to be different from any other political party in Ghana; the CPP has its concepts and its ideological beliefs.
It is based on this socialism concept that the Convention Peoples Party believe they can develop the country and not through capitalist interventions.
Paa Kwesi Nduom did every wrong to tell Ghanaians that he can never assume a political office with CPP and he did not hesitate to grasp the opportunity with both hands when former President Kuffuor offered him the ministerial appointment to take over the ministry of Economic Planning and Regional Cooperation in 2001.
No circumstance could have forced or lured Osagyefo Dr. Kwame Nkrumah to dine from the same bowl with citadels of marginalisation and exploitation that is too impervious to the naïve thinker.
To be an Nkrumahist, one needs to be committed to the Nkrumah Legacy and believe in his ideology. Anything apart this, should not be accepted with the rank and file of the CPP. It is only through conscientisation of the masses about Nkrumah’s ideas that the CPP can be built into a strong uniting force. For Nkrumah still lives in our Bloods. Source Akyereko Frimpong Emmanuel (GIJ)

SETTING THE RECORDS STRAIGHT-1966 OVERTHROW OF NKRUMAH
“A NATIONAL DISASTER”
Akyereko Frimpong Emmanuel
Member
In our last meeting we agreed to work towards uncovering the truth about the justification of the Feb. 24, 1966 topple of the Nkrumah led CPP administration. Before I proceed I will like state emphatically that, I was greatly shocked as to the facts and revelations I uncovered while working on this intellectual project. There is a can of worms about this whole national dilemma.
Let me bring to attention that the Feb. 24 putsch was never supported by the masses but was an act orchestrated by the CIA and its foreign intelligence allies aided by national quislings and traitors.
Now the facts and revelations unfold, let’s get ready for more amazing facts.
Again I will like to state on authority from materials I have laid hands on that the Feb. 24 coup d’état never had the backing of Ghanaians but few power intoxicated greeds who had formed the core component and exponent of the Danquah Busia Anti-Nkrumah propaganda machinery. Indeed the argument has been provoked and I accept the fact that Dr. Nkrumah had suggested a one party system of government. This can be evident in a speech delivered by the foremost Pan-Africanist and undoubtedly the greatest African in history.
“In a socialist state, government represents the people and the masses, In a capitalist state, government represents the exploitative class.”
Dr. Nkrumah had declared on two years before his overthrow,
“Even a system based on a democratic constitution may need some backing up in the period following independence by emergency measures of some totalitarian kind.”
From this juncture we can assert that Dr. Nkrumah had taken a stance on the type of political ideology we wanted the national to be governed through. But this will need the endorsement of the people. In an article quoted from the Statesman a pro-Danquah Busia newspaper in 2007, revealed that Dr. Nkrumah’s push for one part system of government was not achieved by coercive means. In fact Dr. Nkrumah won an overwhelming majority in a referendum organized in 1964 to determine whether the country at that should go under pluralism (multi-party system of rule) or a one party state. According to statistics, 99% of the Ghanaian population voted yes in support of the one party state ideology including the Ashanti region which formed the bedrock of opposition. For the records, the figures stood like this. 2,773,920 voted YES as against 2,452 who voted NO.
If Anti-Nkrumahist elements in the system still claim that Nkrumah was overthrown because he had become a dictator, then they are deceiving themselves and also trying to swindle people to believe that is true. That argument is ipso facto wrong. Two years before the coup, Nkrumah had returned the country to multi-party system of government opposition parties had been created. That argument is defeated on these grounds; there were no traces of one-man show before his overthrow. I pray that as intellectuals we accept this fact and allow it to remain as such.
I will counter the assertion of the Danquah Busia facets about the involvement of the Central Intelligence Agents (CIA) and its Western allies such as the Britain and France in the putsch from the disclosures made by top CIA agents who had enlightened the world by the criminal intentions of the United States of America towards other nations who do not tow their line.
I will dwell on the accounts of three prominent former CIA agents, namely John Stockwell, the CIA agent in the Ivory Coast during the period of President Lyndon Baines Johnson, William P. Mahoney-the USA ambassador to Ghana between the periods of 1964-1968 and lastly Robert W. Komer a national security staffer and CIA analyst for 15 solid years. These three personalities’ role in the coup d’état plot and its execution were exposed in a series of telegrams and memoir such as John Stockwell’s firsthand testimony in his “In Search for The Enemies: A CIA Story. The United States had come to the realisation the treat Dr. Nkrumah posed to their selfish aggrandisement of wealth from Africa. Let’s revisit a quote in a letter to the man who replaced Nkrumah on March 12, 1966 by Robert Komer who had worked as a CIA analyst for 15 years.
“The coup in Ghana” he crowed “is another example of a fortuitous windfall. Nkrumah was doing more to undermine our interest than any other black African. In reaction to his strongly pro-communist leanings, the military regime is almost pathetically pro-western”
They made sure they use every conceivable means and tactics to bring Nkrumah’s down to the ground. This had culminated in seven separate unsuccessful attempts on the life of Nkrumah. The United States whose sense of intolerance Nkrumah’s socialist orientation and pan-African activism knew no bound deliberately caused an economical paradox and rendered abject poverty on the lives of Ghanaians. The US and Britain according to William Mahoney the US ambassador to Ghana at the time had refused aid to the nation being very much aware that the communist duo of China and the Soviet Union were not in any good shape to provide a financial bailout to the country. At this point in history great hardship was unleashed on Ghanaians deliberately by the Britain who had adopted a hard noise attitude towards providing financial aid for the country and the US who had agendas on course. Mahoney who had won the heart of Nkrumah managed to swindle him into believing that the US would come into his aid anytime. So fellow intellects, from a humanistic point of view, it would not be out of place to say that, there was wild agitation through out the length and breadth of this country, and potential quislings and traitors were identified. The CIA were not alone. Dr. Nkrumah wrote in his book 'Dark Days in Ghana’ which was written in Conakry in 1969 three years after his overthrow.
"it has been one of the task of the CIA and other similar organizations" he noted "to discover these potential quislings and traitors in our midst and encourage them, by bribery and the promise of political power, to destroy the constitutional government of our countries" this was indeed the true state of affairs. The CIA had been working hand-in-hand with the Acting Commissioner of Police Harlley and General Otu and Ankrah. These were the front liners who had been coordinating the works of the CIA in Ghana. By their own selfish agendas, they waged several crusades through writings and used propagandist tactics against Nkrumah and capitalised on the worsening economic conditions created by the U.S and its Western allies and preached mischief about Nkrumah and the CPP to Ghanaians. One revealing account rendered from an unlikely source John Stockwell (a CIA insider) in Document 251,Topic one was the Coup d’état Plot, Ghana. This occurred in March 11, 1965. The CIA jubilated that popular opinions in the country at the time had strongly formed against Nkrumah and the economy of the country was in a precarious state.

What has become the argument for some egotistical members of the Danquah Busia tradition has been the introduction of the PDA (Preventive Detention Act) This law put people who criticised the Nkrumah led CPP administration with intent in jail without trail. It is again imperative that I bring to your notice, that I as a journalistic element condemn the detention which led to the death of J.B Danquah in 1963. The 586 people who suffered incarceration by 1963 put us at the wrong side of history and crude affront to free speech.
Before I proceed, I would like to juxtapose this happening to a recent trail and prosecution of an NPP activist Nana Adwakwa Baafi after making what I term as 'comment of naivety and cheap political talk' If Mr. Kwasi Pratt Jnr. condemn vehemently this act by the judicial system, then I believe it could be very hypocritical on his part to holify the PDA.
Now on the issue of the PDA, I will like to attack it on moral grounds and distance my argument a little bit away from politics. There is a biblical saying that I will never forget. "Remove the log on your eyes before trying to alert your neighbour of the petrels on his eyes."
After causing Nkrumah's downfall and seizing political power, Dr. Busia who had replace Dr. Nkrumah introduced a similar law with similar agendas- Protective Custody Act. If they claim the PDA was much inhuman and introduced a cruel form of human rulership, why then the introduction of PCA?
My brothers, I think it is about time our impact on the public perception about this barbaric act and its consequences were made clear and exposed the neo-colonialist elements and the exploitative class in our midst.
In 2007, Kwame Osei Prempeh, then deputy A-G made a remark about this coup in discussion that sparked controversies and agitations and anger from the Nkrumahist camp.
Quoting "The 1966 coup is responsible for the democratic status of Ghana today"
In the same year, Volta regional minister Kofi Dzamesi commended Kotoka of blessed memory for his involvement in the 1966 subversion of government which was ruling by majority consensus.
"It is evident that the coup brought an end to a dictatorial regime which could have exploded into worse situation as some countries in Africa are experiencing now"
Finally, I will take excerpts of former Asokwa MP maxwell Kofi Jumah's assertion about the putsch,
"Though Nkrumah was great leader, it was wise and very prudent that his government was overthrown" In exploring more of his view of this vitriolic episode, he continued " There was enough good reason for what happened to Ghana's first president, because prior to the 1966 coup d’état, prices of good had skyrocketed and the violation of human rights abuse were the order of the day.
Credence to the Statesman for 2007 publication, here are three different personalities in the Anti-Nkrumah camp, justifying Nkrumah's overthrow, I believe the well elaborated facts and evidence I have put across is enough to prove them disabuse your minds of this whole argument.

"The Hypodermic Needle Theory-Critique"

The hypodermic needle theory of mass communication is the notion that media messages are somehow shot into us. Sometimes it's called the bullet theory, sometimes the hypodermic theory, and they somehow affect us in some way that we have no control over. If I shoot some particular medicine in your arm, it's going to affect you in some way. There may be interactions, but a certain number...most people are going to be affected in pretty consistent ways, depending on what chemicals you put in them. And from the earliest days of mass communication, there have been concerns that the media operate like a hypodermic needle. The message is injected into us, it's shot into us, and we have no control. It is completely...we are completely at its mercy. It takes us over, it tells us what to do, it controls us. And people often point to the hypodermic needle theory as a way to dismiss research on media and say, "Well, of course, that's silly. It doesn't affect people that way. If media violence affected people that way, then we wouldn't need research because we'd all be dead because everybody would be so affected by seeing all this mayhem and murder every single night. You would...people would respond by going and shooting their next door neighbor." We don't do that. So the hypodermic needle theory, in some ways, was created as a kind of straw issue by people who try to dismiss the entire field of media affects research. We're often presented with that when we learn about mass communication research, but if you actually go back decades and decades in research, you will never find any actual researchers that believed it. No researcher ever said, "I am working on the hypodermic theory model." In fact, it's a way to critique research. It's a way to oversimplify the views of the public. The way media messages affect us are much more complex and much more subtle than that."