Chinese Dig 9 Graves At Flagstaff House

Published in Daily Guide on August 2, 2012

 By Charles Takyi-Boadu
Construction of a number of graves has begun at the Flagstaff House, the presidential palace located along the Independence Avenue in Accra, for the burial of President John Evans Atta Mills who passed away a little over a week ago.
Yesterday, a number of Ghanaian workers and their Chinese supervisors were seen busily working on the graves at the forecourt of the facility, with a bulldozer excavator and a tipper truck on site.
The graves are nine in number, raising questions about the other bodies to be interred in them apart from that of President Atta Mills.
The graves are about 50 metres away from the main gate of the presidential palace.
There was heavy police presence at the place, making it absolutely impossible for our roving reporters to have access to the place, considering the fact that it is already a high security zone.
But DAILY GUIDE sources have hinted that as many as nine graves are being constructed at the Flagstaff House in defiance of suggestions by a number of Ghanaians including the Metropolitan Catholic Archbishop of Accra, Most Reverend Charles Gabriel Palmer-Buckle.
Others have also condemned the decision of virtually turning the presidential palace, which President Mills declined to use when alive, into a cemetery.
The family of the departed president stated that it wanted the former president to be buried in his hometown, Ekumfi Otuam.
However, a statement issued in Accra yesterday evening by the Funeral Planning Committee (FPC), chaired by Kofi Totobi Kwakye, a former National Security Minister, and signed by Deputy Information Minister James Agyenim-Boateng, spokesperson of the committee, said, “After a series of consultations, the proposed burial sites have been narrowed down to the Kwame Nkrumah Memorial Park and a location within the old Flagstaff House.”
However, attempts to speak to Mr. Agyenim-Boateng to ascertain why a number of graves were being dug at the Flagstaff House, when the committee was yet to take a final decision on the burial place, proved unsuccessful since he did not answer several calls to his mobile phone.
What is also not clear is whether some other bodies would be buried alongside that of the late President Mills in view of the number of graves being dug.

Confusion
A member of the committee and former Chief of Staff under the Rawlings regime, Nana Ato Dadzie, who spoke on the issue earlier in the day, said the place was an ideal location for the burial of the late president.
That, he said, was because there was enough space at the presidential palace to serve as a burial ground for the late president, insisting that it would not affect the sensitivity of any president who intended to operate from the premises.
Nana Ato Dadzie, who spoke on Metro TV’s Good Morning Ghana, said, “A portion of that land has President Nkrumah’s residence, there is a portion which used to have a whole zoo and President [John] Kufuor rightly thought that we needed an edifice so he put up a house, popularly known as Jubilee House, and it’s only one facility on a portion of that land so there is a lot of space out there where it could be developed.”
The committee was reported to have visited and held discussions with the leadership of Parliament, the National Chief Imam, the Chief Justice and the Council of State as part of ongoing consultations to build a national consensus on the funeral and burial arrangements for the late president.
“The FPC briefed them on the proposed funeral arrangements and used the discussions to seek their opinions on an appropriate resting place for President Atta Mills,” the statement said.
But Most Rev. Charles Palmer-Buckle appealed to the Mills funeral committee to consider the Kwame Nkrumah Mausoleum for the burial of the late President John Mills.
That, according to him, was because the mausoleum held such an important historical significance that it could only be the best burial grounds for the late president.
“We were there and there is enough space and the place is historical for the dear country Ghana because that is where Kwame Nkrumah declared independence for the country and so if it becomes a place where all our future heads of state would be buried that would be great,” he told Joy FM yesterday.
He even suggested exhuming the bodies of all former heads of state to be buried there.
Former Chief of Staff under the erstwhile Kufuor administration that constructed the facility, Kwadwo Okyere Mpiani, has equally spoken against any attempt to convert the presidential palace into burial grounds for former heads of state.
He said the committee ought to build a consensus among Ghanaians before finally settling on the venue since another president could decide not to allow the place to be turned into a cemetery.

How Mills Died: Sister Tells All

Published in Daily Guide on July 31, 2012

By Charles Takyi-Boadu
Information available to DAILY GUIDE indicates that President John Evans Atta Mills might have died before arriving at the 37 Military Hospital where he was rushed to after he slumped at the Castle a week ago.
Sources said the late president got to the health facility at around 1:35pm unannounced, looking pale and cold when he was examined in the ambulance van that took him to the hospital.
The sudden death of President Mills is generating issues, with some calling for an autopsy report.
The sister of the president, Mercy Araba Quarshie, said she and other siblings were with the president just a few minutes before his departure.
According to Madam Quarshie, the family members had visited the Castle on the morning of last Tuesday and dined with him before he told them that he was having a neck pain.
 President Siblings
The president’s sister told Oman FM yesterday that they prayed with President Mills and later sang gospel songs with him while sending their last brother, Samuel Atta Mills, who lived at the Castle with the departed president, to buy cervical collar (neck brace) to support his neck.
By that time, according to Madam Quarshie, his doctors had attended to him and left.
She said after that, they left for Cape Coast around 1pm only to be told 15 minutes later by Dr Cadman Mills that the president had been rushed to the hospital.
By that time, they were already at Kasoa and within a short distance of reaching Awutu Senya, they were told that President Mills was gone.
President Mills died a week ago and the one-week gathering will be marked today with a minute’s silence across the country.
Some, including former President Jerry John Rawlings, have a strong belief that if a true disclosure of Mills’s health had been made, he could have survived a little longer.
The issue of the president’s health had been the subject of considerable speculation and concern but his handlers constantly assured Ghanaians of his sound health whilst skeptics insisted there was more to the deteriorating health of the president.
Sources at the Castle have started revealing details about events leading to his sudden death to DAILY GUIDE.
Information has it that on the evening of Monday, July 23, 2012, a day before his untimely death, President Mills complained of severe pains, hence calling in his doctors the following day.
By 10am, the doctors were called in immediately to assess the situation.
On the same day, Tuesday, July 24, 2012, sources said, he was handed a bunch of documents believed to be from the oil and gas sector, which he was asked to examine and endorse.
By that time, Mills, who was said to be showing signs of weakness, became agitated and declined to look at the documents.
He was said to have summoned an aide to take the documents to his secretary, J.K. Bebaako Mensah and that within seconds that the aide left the office of the president, he heard a loud scream from there.
The aide rushed back to the office to find the president lying on the floor with blood oozing from his mouth and nose.
Unnecessary Delays
In the heat of the confusion and the panic that ensued, President Mills was said to have been bundled onto a stretcher and into a stationary ambulance at the Osu Castle and sent to 37 Military Hospital with no notice to the medical officials there.
But, according to the source, the outriders (police dispatch riders) were nowhere to be found to lead the ambulance to the hospital.
This was said to have caused a delay in the decision-making process as to whether to take the former president to the 37 Military Hospital or what to do, a situation that was said to have been compounded by the non-availability of the outriders when needed.
Unconfirmed reports said the outriders were accompanying the Prof’s sisters to Cape Coast.
Not long after reaching the hospital, the president was pronounced dead.
Indications are that adequate measures had not been put in place to give special treatment to the president since authorities at the facility had not been given any prior information of him being sent there.
According to a source at the hospital, when they got there at 1:35pm, they went to the Emergency and Medical ward where they were turned away apparently because they did not know that it was the president.
He was then taken to the Maternity Block where they were sent back to the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) where a certain female nurse, a Lieutenant Colonel, identified the body as that of the president and asked them to do the right thing.
Coroner’s Inquest
Apparently, the officials following the body told the health officials that it was the body of a senior government official who was involved in an accident.
But with no health record of the president at the hospital, the Lt. Col. insisted that the right thing should be done.
With that development, health officials said they needed the coroner’s report to ascertain the cause of death since he was taken there dead or he was there less than 24 hours before his death.
After that, Mrs. Naadu Mills and other ministers were spotted at the facility wailing.
Later in the afternoon, Chief of Staff Henry Martey Newman called former Presidents Rawlings and J.A. Kufuor to inform them of the death of President Mills.
Hidden Secrets
Two weeks before his demise, President Mills had a private meeting with former President Rawlings at the seat of government at which they were said to have, among other things, discussed his health and the strains he was going through with his work schedule, as well as concerns about colleagues in the NDC.
That was said to be due to the fact that he was having difficulties in the day-to-day administration of the country in view of his failing health.
But handlers of the former president were said to have often propped him to continue keeping up appearances, contrary to expert advice from his medical doctors both at home and abroad who wanted him to take time off his busy schedule to rest.
Meanwhile, his doctors in the United States were said to have wanted to put him on admission for an extra two months to enable him to recover and have enough rest but the old man’s handlers would not listen.
Instead, they rushed him back home.
When the president arrived in the country from the United States, he was made to jog under the hot weather at the Kotoka International Airport to prove to his critics that he was stronger than ever.
Even though it was obvious from his nasal voice and frailty that the man was not well, the president told Ghanaians his doctors had given him a clean bill of health.
Reports have it that the medical records of the former president had been altered and changed over a period to misrepresent the state of his health before he passed away.
As the nation mourns because it has lost a president, Ghanaians are calling for the transparency needed when it comes to matters concerning public of figures.
It would be recalled that the body of one of America’s most venerable presidents, John Fitzgerald Kennedy, underwent two autopsies to ascertain what really caused his death despite the fact that it was public knowledge that he was assassinated.

4 Names Drop In Race For Veep

Published in Daily Guide on July 26, 2012

By Charles Takyi-Boadu

Just a day after President John Dramani Mahama took over the reins of power, interesting names have started popping up as likely contenders for the position of vice president, following the vacuum created by his elevation occasioned by the death of President Atta Mills.
President Mahama presided over an emergency cabinet meeting where he prayed for the repose of the soul of his former boss.
However, jostling for the coveted slot of vice president has intensified, as names being bandied about on the corridors of power include Paul Victor Obeng, a former presidential advisor and current chairman of the National Development Planning Commission (NDPC).
Others are Trade Minister Hannah Tetteh; Lands and Natural Resources Minister Mike Allen Hammah and Goosie Tanoh of the defunct National Reform Party (NRP) fame.
Apart from P.V. Obeng who comes from the Ashanti Region, the three others are from the Central Region and there are indications that the home region of the departed president may have the slot.
Mr Hammah who comes from Winneba appears to stand tall among all the names mentioned.
Strangely, former Communications Director for the late president’s campaign team, Seth Ohene Ofori said four days to the demise of President Mills, people had started jockeying for the position of vice president.

Goosie Tanoh and Mike Hammah

That notwithstanding, “I think he would look at it carefully. He will pick someone who is very competent, someone who can partner him to ensure that Ghana moves forward without any disruption,” he told Joy FM yesterday.
“I know President John Mahama very very well. I think he will pick someone that Ghanaians will be happy (with); someone who will meet the aspirations of Ghanaians; someone who can deliver and make the ‘Better Ghana Agenda’ a reality,” he said.
Asked whether or not it was true that President Mills was at a point in time considering stepping down- a reason for which people could be jostling for a possible vice presidential slot- Mr Ofori said, “It’s difficult to give you a yes or no answer, very difficult.
“Politics, you know, is quite an interesting thing. Any development comes with its reaction and definitely people try to look at the future and see where they can position themselves,” he noted.
But sources in the ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) have hinted that those being pushed by the ‘hawks’ in the party include P.V. Obeng and Agric Minister Kwesi Ahwoi (the youngest of the Ahwoi brothers). But moderates in the NDC are pushing the likes of Hannah Tetteh and Member of Parliament for Ellembele, Emmanuel Armah Buah.
Ekwow Spio-Garbrah’s name also popped up, but allegedly from a pastor and the Rawlings camp.
Another view gaining grounds in the party is not just the intention but the need to use the situation as an opportunity to extend an olive branch to the NDC founder and former President Rawlings by making his wife, Nana Konadu Agyeman-Rawlings as the vice president to enable them to join the NDC 2012 campaign, which they have declined to be part of.
This is expected to meet a stiff opposition from the hawks in the party who feel the Rawlingses have already jumped ship with the formation of the National Democratic Party (NDP).
The president is set to meet the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the NDC today to fashion out ideas on who to settle on as a possible vice president.
Cabinet Meeting
An emergency cabinet meeting at the Osu Castle was graced by senior party officials including NDC General Secretary Johnson Asiedu Nketia.
President John Mahama, ministers and senior party officials were all clad in red and black and in a somber mood.
The president prayed that the adversity that had hit the country shall be turned into an opportunity for the masses of Ghanaians.
President Mahama cancelled his day’s activities, including a trip to Tamale.