Hugo Chavez sponsors coup in Ghana?

I thought it was funny when I first heard it. Prez Kuffour at it again. Then I told a diplomat who had not hear it yet. His response " who advises this president at all". I went home smiling thinking it was one of those things people say when they mout political platforms.

But as I laid on my bed starring at the ceiling many ideas came to mind. I remembered a Ghanaian businessman telling me on a flight what happens when they hear the word "coup". They think about their investments and how much they stand to loose when that eventually happens.

To cut it to the core, coups are not good news to anyone. Not the country, not the investors not the potential investors and not the continent.
We have had these in the past, all proved to be empty threats.

Rawlings have been equivocal in his comments (That I know) but on coups he has said many times that he has no interest in doing that again. I have heard off record, a comment by one of Rawllings' confidants that "prez kuffour will not be dignified with a coup".


I hope the president will focus on running Ghana and stop this pranks. We are many years behind and we can't afford to be doing this.
Comment:- by Isaac TETTEH blog owner

Accra Air Force base to house hanger for US regional aircraft

The Accra Air Force Base is to house a new hanger for the US Embassy's C-12 aircraft that would provide regional support for its mission in Ghana and 26 other embassies in West and Central Africa.

The aircraft was attached to the US missions in Dakar and Monrovia and until 2004 it was based in Abidjan, La Cote d'Ivoire. A new operating location had to be found for it after the deterioration of the political situation in Cote d'Ivoire.

The Ghana Government and the Ghana Air Force provided the space to park and maintain the aircraft when it arrived in Accra in early 2004 until a proper hanger was built for it.

The aircraft, capable of flying 1,200 miles - about five and half hours in the air - depending on its mission, can carry about eight passengers.

At a short ceremony at the Air Force Base in Accra on Thursday to unveil the project, Ms Pamela Bridgewater, US Ambassador in Ghana, said the construction of the hanger represented the commitment of both countries to bilateral relations as well as their joint goal of promoting stability and cooperation in the West Africa Sub-Region and throughout Africa.

She extended the US Congress's appreciation to the Ghana Air Force for providing such support and expressed appreciation to the Government of Ghana for giving the C-12 a new home.

Air Vice-Marshal Joseph Boateng, Chief of Air Staff of the Ghana Air Force, also expressed appreciation to the governments of the Ghana and the US for bringing the militaries of both countries together.

He said the Ghana Air Force enjoyed the training support from the US and expressed the hope that such cooperation would continue into the future.

JAK Defends JJ Coup Allegations

President John Agyekum Kufuor has strongly defended allegations of a coup plot he made against former President Rawlings, at a by-election rally in the Offinso South Constituency at the weekend.

The President has also dismissed criticisms that the platform on which he spoke about such a sensitive national issue was improper.

His Spokesperson, Mr Andrew Awuni in an interview said, the President indeed has impeccable security reports, linking Mr Rawlings to renewed attempts to truncate the nation's 14-year-old democratic experiment through the barrel of the gun and that he has no regrets for making the matter public at a political rally.

Over the weekend, President Kufuor directly accused his predecessor of seeking financial help from an unnamed oil rich nation to topple his government.

It was the first time the President made any such allegation against Mr Rawlings, whose public utterances have been cited by some powerful New Patriotic Party (NPP) guns as synonymous to treason.

Mr Awuni said President Kufuor is confident that the nation’s security personnel are willing and ready to protect and defend nation’s constitution and security at all times. Meanwhile, Mr Fifi Kwettey, a spokesperson to the former President has declared that his boss does not need external funding in order to stage yet another successful coup d’ tat a in the country.

Fifi Kwettey told newsmen that Mr Rawlings has no intension of destabilizing the democratic dispensation he helped establish in 1992, instead, the good people of Ghana would themselves topple the NPP regime through a democratic election in the 2008 elections.

Critics of Mr Rawlings say his public utterances about perceived hardship in the country these days and alleged massive bribery and corruption in the government of the NPP are similar to those he made prior to his second successful coup which overthrew the Liman regime.

His critics have used this as basis to conclude that Mr Rawlings is a a serious threat to national security.
Source:Citi FM

Rawlings urges international media to report accurately on Ghana

Former President Jerry Rawlings on Thursday urged western governments and the international media to do diligent reportage of events in Ghana.

He argued that western governments and their media were turning the other way "on serious issues such as corruption, human rights abuses, intimidation and rule of fear”. Former President Rawlings, who was speaking at a press conference in Accra, said he now aspired to greater principles than clinging on to power.

He said power had a way of making one to feel invincible giving one the urge to cling on to power, "but the truth is that I have no urge to have power and I am doing nothing to come back to power. "I have never and would never go anywhere to look for money to plot a coup.

What I have been doing over the years is to tell the truth about the state of corruption and abuse of human rights in the country that is going on, on the blind side of both local and foreign media; with the western governments notably the U.S. and U.K."

Former President Rawlings said he would not stop doing this until the government sat up and began to attend to the development needs of Ghanaians.

He said US President George Bush's constant praising of President John Agyekum Kufuor without critically examining the state of governance, was a systematic way of creating a culture of impunity, where the government would begin to think that it could get away with anything it did.

He alleged that CNN's Jeff Koinenge was whisked away to Iraq in 2001, just when he was preparing to do documentaries on the human rights, corruption and the rot in the judiciary in Ghana. "These are some of the machinations that when I talk about, I am accused of plotting against the government."

Asked if he ever proposed to the then President-elect John Agyekum Kufuor to use his (Rawlings’) Ministers since they had several years of governance experience; Former President Rawlings said:

"I only casually suggested Mr Paul Victor Obeng, who had a great sense of governance issues then, to be part of a transitional body in order to avoid a vacuum during the period of transition from the National Democratic Congress to the New Patriotic Party.
"Ladies and gentlemen, is this something wrong? It was only a suggestion and they had the right to decide on what to do."

Former President Rawlings said he welcomed the efforts of religious bodies to patch up relations between him and President Kufuor. "However, they must first ensure that they do not just bandage a wound. They must first clean it, and put medication before bandaging it.

They must also work to right all the wrongs they have committed against innocent people across the country."

He said the National Reconciliation Commission was unable to reconcile the nation, and the security agencies were unable to arrest the killers of the Ya-Na Yakubu Andani II, the Overlord of Dagbon Traditional Area, and 30 others in Yendi.