When organized labour called off its intended strike over illegal mining, the academic fashionista and NDC’s lead social media campaigner, Professor Ransford Gyampo immediately granted a bevy of media interviews, and crowned that with a long ego-massaging Facebook post. In these interviews and commentaries, the Prof called out organized labour in his usual hyper-emotional, contradictory and illogical posturing, garnering substantial cheers from largely NDC elements, whose last hope for electoral salvation was the threat by organized labour to shut down the country.
Gyampo’s Facebook post must be a source of profound worry to my former UTAG Colleagues, and especially to the National leadership of UTAG based at the premier University of the North -UDS. Prof Gyampo, in trademark condescending diction accused organized labour for lack of candour, and authoritatively hinted that he will railroad the pliant UTAG leadership to declare a strike action.
The fact that the UTAG leadership did not see anything wrong with the ego-chasing Professor’s adventures raises worrying questions about their own sincerity and integrity in the galamsey brouhaha. He sought glory by undermining the leadership, sadly they casually endorsed it.
We first have to ask, and proceed to answer the question; why is UTAG on strike? UTAG itself has no answer except that a single person who knows more than everybody in this country wants to please his pay masters.
The original motion for strike, according to sources within UTAG, was to join organized labour in the well-intentioned galamsey advocacy to get government to take immediate action. We were subsequently informed that government had accepted most of the major and sensible proposals put forward by organized labour to halt the galamsey menace. Organized labour responded by suspending the strike, like any rational group will do. UTAG (Prof Gyampo) failed to behave rationally, opting instead for showmanship and needless bravado. The reasonable expectation was that UTAG would have rather behaved like organized labour, and proceeded to subject government’s proposals to diligent scrutiny. It is a shame that the nation’s intellectual force pandered to the greedy motives of a self-seeking political activist in academic gown.
All along, Gyampo’s version of UTAG insisted it was committed to ending galamsey devoid of politics. They contended that pragmatic solutions were needed to preserve our environment and water bodies. But it is strange that a group, an intellectual one at that, seeking solutions to a problem did not find the proprietary in evaluating proposals from a major stakeholder like government, and opted instead to direct government to declare a state of emergency.
What exactly is a state of emergency? Did they take time to understand what they were asking for? At the same time that these pseudo-nationalists were haranguing government on solutions, they callously turned a blind eye to the marauding NDC that sought to eat from both sides of their mouth; urging Gyampo and his polarized elite to inundate government with baseless calls for a state of emergency whilst promising illegal miners protection in the unlikely event they won power. On this score, it is terrifying how Gyampo and his UTAG have managed to label every dissenting voice to their misadventure as partisan whilst convincing themselves that they are on a ‘national’ cause.
Did it have to come to this? UTAG has long been recognized as a strong voice with the muscle and integrity to take on major issues of national concern.
Nowhere in UTAG’s stellar years has the association allowed an overrated individual with uncontrolled ego to mislead it. It is sad that I have to address my former colleague, Prof Gyamfo in not-so-charitable terms. But it is worth it to send signals that being a political science professor is a great achievement but that does not bestow on one all the knowledge and expertise in everything. Academics enjoy criticizing others but they also like to engage with other voices. It cannot be the case that every opinion put out by any other person is dumb.
Gyampo comes across as finding it so hard to see his own ignorance, or on very mild terms, his human limitations. He is unwilling to admit mistakes, and certainly lacks intellectual humility; that characteristic that allows for admission of wrongness.
On this score, I find it irritating that Prof Gyampo keeps using the phrase ‘the voice of conscience.’ That this phrasing is misleading when it comes to him as a person is not in doubt.
Every first year student of ethics knows that when there are unequal power relationships, the one wielding more power ought to be circumspect. When our academic fashionista was subjected to this test in relation to his young female students, he failed massively. Elsewhere, the good Professor would have violently kissed good bye to the classroom. That he is still around and has the temerity to talk about conscience says a lot about the pretense that has now come to be called ‘speaking truth to power.’
But all these would not take away the Professor’s right to criticize and proffer solutions, if any. The Professor’s uncivil approach may be a reflection of his career experience. He is accustomed to giving orders and having them obeyed. Unlike some of his colleagues, there is no record of the Professor having any experience at any other place, and so his proclivity for a mechanical process to discussions on national issues may be understood in that light. He likes nasty rhetoric, and downplays the competence of people who have had cross-sectoral experiences, believing that every problem has roots in classroom methodological confines. There are many smart people in government and in organized labour. These people rationally reflected and felt that declaring a state of emergency is not one of the solutions to the galamsey issue. It’s especially bad to do so when the data doesn’t support the calls to panic.
I would therefore admonish my former colleagues, the generality of UTAG, to hold fast to their time-honoured principles of subjecting issues to the toothcomb of objective analysis and refuse the invitation to join political merchants and ‘influencepreneurs’ to damage the hard-won image of the association.
In concluding this piece, I am going back to my former colleague, Prof Gyampo. Those who have been elected have the mandate to govern. Those of us who elect them including Prof Gyamfo have the responsibility to demand accountability. What we do not have is the unchecked license to suggest that only our opinions should matter. I am aware Prof Gyampo is enjoying the Facebook reactions to his verbose tantrums. He is a seasoned researcher and should be able to do a rapid survey of his Facebook worshippers. Prof Gyampo will discover that they all come from his political party. But that doesn’t make him popular even among this group. Let him offer himself to be elected to the high office of President as an independent candidate. All his followers will vote for Madam Akua Donkor if she stood on the ticket of the NDC.
By Osabutey Philips
