No Parsimony Here

The lavish use of money in local politics is heading for a fever pitch. Nowhere is the anomaly more pronounced than in the incumbent government whose sight is so passionately locked on the retention of power that no amount is too big for the project.

Thankfully for Ghanaians, the application of money and plenty of it to woo people to the side of the incumbent government and, as it were, destroy the fortunes of other players within the same party and outside it, is being given vent by the unfolding feud in the ruling party.

We hear June 4 would see the National Democratic Congress (NDC) founder doing more laundry of the misapplication of public money in the open, a suggestion that we have only seen a tip of the iceberg of what lies ahead.

The engagement between Herbert Mensah and Victor Smith yesterday on Adom FM was an irresistible schedule for politically-minded Ghanaians because of the emanating revelations.

Herbert Mensah reminded many who listened to him about his grisly revelations during an earlier media encounter when he tackled pre-2008 NDC politics. During that epic engagement, he asked Ato Ahwoi whether he was not the one who claimed Mills could not go on as a presidential candidate because he had, among other things, become delusional and been seeing trees.

Yesterday, however, he was not painting pictures about a president seeing men walking with their heads down but how such a leader has committed unusually large amounts of money towards political projects such as convincing disgruntled Andani youth in Tamale to sheath their swords and flood the streets of the regional capital as the President went visiting.

Another version of the political project is calling the bluff of the one-time First Lady who appears to be hell-bent on going the whole hog in scuttling the old Prof�s dream.

It is a capital-intensive political project capable of inciting inflation, maybe the runaway strain. A feeble government response to the Herbert Mensah allegation of money spraying� leaving everything to God� is an indication of a capitulation.

The spraying of money in a political milieu is a precedence which should not be encouraged because it can putrefy the political system and render it unappealing to good people who want to serve their nation through an association with political parties.

It is as if politics is all about making money and society-enhancing service which is the desired objective, of little significance. The desire to remain in power, using society-destroying means to influence opinion leaders and even chiefs is what corruption is all about and the political society is inundated with it.

The impunity with which contracts are poorly executed and sometimes governments dragged to court to demand payments for these all have their roots in the corruption-propelled political activities by the incumbent government. Aren�t politicians their own enemies?